In 1981, it was reported that gay men in major US cities were being treated for rare diseases that would later be known as the markers of HIV/AIDS. The disease spread rapidly in metropolitan areas, largely among members of the LGBTQ+ community. The cause and ways of prevention would not be known for some time, and the US government refused to acknowledge the disease for much longer. President Ronald Reagan famously would not say the word "AIDS" until 1985. The stigma, fear, anger, and sorrow that surrounded this crisis inspired and necessitated the creation of works of art, both as a way to express the feelings of the artists and to bring awareness to the issue. Many of the artists and photographers are members of the LGBTQ+ community who were already creating works that dealt with politics, culture, and social issues. It is because of this that there will be selected works that don't just deal with HIV and AIDS in order to showcase the full breadth of the artists and their subjects.
Although the AIDS crisis is something that is mostly associated with the 1980s and early 1990s, it is an ongoing issue that still affects people in the 21st century. Works of art are still produced to reflect the experiences and feelings of those living with HIV/AIDS. This page will showcase a couple of those artists as well as those of the 1980s and 1990s.
Warning:this page will include visual art that depicts nudity, profanity, and some disturbing images.
Keith Haring (1959 - 1990)
Keith Haring was born in 1958 in Reading, Pennsylvania. As a child, he learned cartooning basics from his father (a cartoonist) and by looking at the popular culture around him. This influenced his work and style, which would depict politics, sex, society, and culture through a series of cartoonish figures that often emphasized interconnectedness and unity. Although he was admitted to art school in Pittsburgh, he dropped out after two semesters after realizing that his interests did not lie with commercial graphic art. It was at this point that he began to work with abstract, interconnected figures. He moved to New York City in 1978 and began to immerse himself in the diverse art community as he attended the School of Visual Arts. It was at this time that he also began to explore who he was as a gay man. His artwork tended to be in the mediums of street art and graffiti, but as time went on he also began to with collage, painting, drawing, sculpting, and writing. He found success throughout the 1980s and opened his own retail space called the Pop Shop in which he sold his artwork. It was in 1988 that Keith Haring was diagnosed with AIDS, and his work began to shift toward the subjects of AIDS and safe sex. A sperm with devil horns, representing the disease, began to show up in some of his work. He produced murals, posters, paintings, and drawings to spread words of support and warning, famously using the phrase “Silence = Death” in one of his works for the group ACT UP. His final work was a large, carved triptych altarpiece depicting a Madonna and Child figure weeping over a crowd. It was displayed during his memorial service after he died of an AIDS-related illness in 1990.
David Wojnarowicz (1954 - 1992)
Born in New Jersey in 1954, David Wojnarowicz was an artist whose work largely dealt with class, culture, society, sex, and politics, and he used photography, film, poetry, painting, sculpting, and printmaking. He experienced a difficult childhood and adolescence and had dropped out before graduating high school in New York City. In 1979, he met Peter Hujar, a photographer who acted as a mentor and sometimes lover to Wojnarowicz, who famously said: “Everything I made, I made for Peter.” In Peter Hujar, he found someone who saw his art as something important that should be taken seriously. It was in 1986 that Wojnarowicz’s work started to turn his art and activism toward the AIDS crisis after Hujar was told he was HIV positive. By 1987, Peter Hujar had died, and Wojnarowicz was creating works such as his three-part photograph series that depicted Hujar in the moments after his death. The disease quickly started to burn through his life. Wojnarowicz’s lover was diagnosed in 1987, Wojnarowicz in 1988. One of his most famous works, Untitled (One day this kid…), was produced sometime between 1990 and 1991. The text around the photo of his 9 year old self speaks of all the horrors he will experience simply because he will one day realize that he is gay. It is perhaps one of his most famous, striking pieces of art. David Wojnarowicz showed anger in much of his art, but it is an understandable rage that was born in a cruel and unfair world. Upon his death in 1992, his lover scattered his ashes on the White House lawn.
ACT UP and Gran Fury
ACT UP and Gran Fury occupy a unique place on this list in that neither one is an actual human or artist. The AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP) is a grassroots organization that has been working to end the AIDS epidemic since 1987. They worked with several artists, including Keith Haring and David Wojnarowicz, to put out works of art and posters to spread information and dispel misinformation about AIDS and HIV as well as bring attention to political inaction. Gran Fury, a collective of artists, formed out of ACT UP and became its “artistic arm” to get the message of ACT UP out into the world. They would often publish works by named artists or simply produce works under the name of the collective. It was ACT UP that created and popularized the phrase “Silence = Death,” now synonymous with the AIDS activist movements of the 1980s. The actions of ACT UP and the work of Gran Fury are ongoing, as the AIDS crisis itself is ongoing, although the artwork that they are most famous for are from 1987 - 1991.
General Idea (1969 - 1994)
A collective of three artists – Felix Partz, Jorge Zontal, and AA Bronson – was formed in Toronto, Canada in 1969. Their work initially centered around performance art events under the name of the “Miss General Idea Beauty Pageant.” They eventually began to produce works such as FILE Magazine (meant intentionally to be mixed up with LIFE) and began to move into creating site-specific installations, murals, sculptures, film, photographs, and paintings. Even as they continued to examine and satirize society, the collective also began to work with sex, sexuality, and identity within their works. After shifting from the use of the “Miss General Idea” figure, they began to use poodles in many of their works, including a series of ten images entitled Mondo Cane Kama Sutra, which depicted three fluorescent colored poodles engaging in various sexual acts. Toward the end of the 1980s and the beginning of the 1990s, their work began to focus almost entirely on HIV and AIDS. One of their final works together, Fin de siècle, depicts three stuffed baby seals on Styrofoam planks as three endangered creatures that the world may have been more inclined to save than three gay men at risk for dying of AIDS. By 1989 and 1990, Partz and Zontal had been diagnosed with HIV and both passed away of AIDS-related illnesses in 1994. Bronson still produces work as a solo artist, but he considered General Idea to be disbanded upon the deaths of his partners.
Nan Goldin (1953 - )
Nan Goldin’s photography has almost always focused on the LGBT community. She was especially fascinated by photographing drag queens. Her friendship with David Wojnarowicz and Peter Hujar would have a huge impact on her life, but she began her work long before she met either one. In 1973, she had her first solo show in Boston. Her work throughout the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s depicted herself, friends, and lovers in a deeply personal and connected way. One of her most popular subjects was Cookie Mueller, an actress known for her work in John Waters' early films and a close friend of Goldin's. She was photographed over the years by Goldin until her death in 1989 of AIDS-related illness. As the people around her began to fall ill and oftentimes die of AIDS, Nan Goldin took portraits with the same care she did with all of her subjects. She still produces work, more recently focusing on drug addiction in her series Memory Lost.
Eric Avery (1948 - )
Born in 1948 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Avery grew up in Texas and went to college first for art and then for medicine. He acquired a BA in Fine Art in 1970 and became a medical doctor in 1974. His focus became psychiatry, and he spent much of his time between 1980 and 1981 working with Vietnamese and Somalian refugees. During the growing AIDS epidemic of the 1980s, Dr. Avery experienced the crisis both personally as a physician and personally as a gay man. All of his work (mostly done through printing from linoleum and woodblocks) focuses on issues of public health, politics, sexuality, and human rights. Much of his work has moved toward education through the creation of pamphlets and posters that can help patients and those who view his art. His 2003 work Art For Medicine is a lithograph that was designed to be folded to either show text and images explaining the importance of affordable HIV/AIDS treatments or the phrase “IT’S NOT ALL ABOUT MONEY” over Warhol-esque dollar signs. The printing ink has crushed discarded HIV medications mixed into it, and more crushed medication fell out when it was opened. He continues to create works of art meant to educate and bring attention to issues, including the ongoing HIV and AIDS crisis as well as the opioid crisis and mental health awareness.
Toni Kitti (1975 - )
A Finland-based artist, Toni Kitti found out he had AIDS in 2012 after it nearly killed him while he was in Berlin. By his own admission, he had not believed that the disease really existed after reading about anti-AIDS conspiracies on the internet. After surviving a major health scare, Kitti moved back to Helsinki and began to create art that depicted his struggle to survive with AIDS. His first major exhibition, The Persistence of Plastic, is his largest to date and was completed in 2016, although he has completed other single works. The images of himself show the Kaposi’s Sarcoma lesions that are on his body, something he was initially ashamed of. The theme of the exhibition deals with overcoming shame as well as his obsession with plastic, a material that does not decay.