Nancer LeMoins, 'Will Art Save My Life?,' 1997.

Aims of the Project

'The Art of AIDS Prevention' is a comparative research project that investigates the way in which people living with HIV/AIDS, and the communities most affected by the disease, have been represented in cultural media in Australia and the United States. In particular, it aims to:

1. explain how representations of the epidemic influence personal behaviour, public opinion and the formation of public policy;

2. demonstrate how, through the production of images and narratives that challenged existing myths and stereotypes about AIDS, artists and cultural producers sought to recast stigmatising and destructive representations of the epidemic;

3. examine the effectiveness of public health initiatives that utilised visual and performing artists and filmmakers, as well as cultural events, to educate about the risk of HIV transmission, and to heal and rebuild the communities that have been most severely affected by AIDS.

The project poses questions based around the four themes. Information and preliminary findings about each theme can be accessed by clicking on the headings below.

Themes of the Project

1. 'Deviant', 'Dangerous', 'Deserving' and 'Doomed': The Cultural Construction of People with HIV/AIDS in the First Five Years of the Epidemic
2. Portraying People Living with HIV: Art as Activism in the Age of AIDS (c.1987-1994)
3. Challenging Representational Strategies in the Second Decade of the Epidemic
4. Drawing the Line Against HIV: The Art of AIDS Prevention

Please click on the below links for information about other aspects of the project.

• About the Project
• Artist Interviews
• Conference
• About the Researchers
• Key Works -- a short list of writings about the cultural representation of HIV/AIDS