Untitled
curated by
Shana Agid,
Advocate, Legal Aid Society: Prisoners' Rights Project
In the past year and a half I have been blessed with a new way of seeing art and art about AIDS. In the New York State prisons, artists' work is limited only by a lack of materials -- the men and women living with HIV/AIDS behind those walls (from whom I have learned this way of seeing) make incredible art. Not all of their work is strictly about being positive, but it is about their dreams, fantasies, distractions, realities, and anger. Seeing the art these women and men have created informed my vision as I chose the images by HIV-positive artists. The brilliance of color in many of them -- as well as the incisive rage of some and the feeling of peace in others -- speak to a familiar range and depth of expressions. This creates in me a mixture of serenity and fury which I draw on to keep working both as an artist and an activist.
1. Rodney Brown "Untitled" 24"x18" pastel on paper 1995
2. Rebecca Guberman "Polaroid Transfer Series #10" 16"x20" color photo 1997
3. Chet Holcomb "Sampson's Will" 12"x23" , acrylic on canvas 1993
4. Affrekka Jefferson "All That Glitters" 11.5"x14.5", mixed media 1991
5. Frank Jump "Reckit's Blue, Brooklyn" 11"x14", Cibachrome 1997
6. David Lee "Gateway" 36"x30", acrylic on canvas,1997
7. Leslie Kaliades "Untitled" 17"x11" c-print 1996
8. Leslie Kaliades "Untitled" 17"x11" c-print 1996
9. David Nelson "Train, Man, Dice (9)" 12.5"x9", graphite on paper, 1995
10. David Nelson "Train, Man, Dice (10)" 12.5"x9", graphite on paper, 1995
11. David Nelson "Train, Man, Dice (3)" 12.5"x9", graphite on paper, 1995
12. David Nelson "Train, Man, Dice (1)" 12.5"x9", graphite on paper, 1995
13. Becky Trotter "Nude Landscape1" no dimensions, pastel on paper 1994
14. Becky Trotter "I'm Not Comfortable" 11"x14", acrylic on canvas board 1997
Shana Agid works at the Legal Aid Society: Prisoners' Rights Project as an advocate for HIV postive prisoners in New York State. She also does work with other groups fighting the prison industrial complex and is a printmaker and bookbinder, making art whenever she can get her hands on the time and space.
Visual AIDS: 526 w26th st no 510 new york new york 10001 tel: 212 627 9855 fax: 212.6279815 email visaids@earthlink.net