A look back at the power and impact of AIDS-era poster art
December 1st is World AIDS Day and we take a look at a landmark publication dedicated to a surprising aspect of the AIDS pandemic.
Forty years ago, a mysterious wasting illness first linked to promiscuous sex and intravenous drug use became a global epidemic and the focus of a massive public health campaign and activist community. Now, a new publication by RIT Press documents the power and impact of nearly 200 examples of AIDS educational posters from around the world and the social activism that continues to bring awareness to a disease without vaccine or cure.
Up Against the Wall: Art, Activism, and the AIDS Poster, Edited by Donald Albrecht, Jessica Lacher-Feldman, and William M. Valenti M.D. offers a fresh perspective on watershed decades in our community.
“This book brings the 2022 AIDS poster exhibition to life. The authors’ deep captions tell the story behind the poster and provide deeper insight into history of the HIV pandemic,” said Valenti, medical and consulting editor, infectious diseases specialist in Rochester, N.Y, and co-founder of Community Health Network, now Trillium Health.
As early as 1981, the CDC first reported the illness that later would be named HIV/AIDS. Since then, “an estimated 78 million people have become infected with HIV, and 35 million people have died of AIDS-related illnesses,” writes Donald Albrecht in the introduction to Up Against the Wall: Art, Activism, and the AIDS Poster. Albrecht edited the book with Jessica Lacher-Feldman and William M. Valenti M.D., (hardcover, 232 pages, 187 illustrations).
DR. ANTHONY FAUCI
“The interactions I had with ACT UP and others in the activist community during the AIDS crisis were transformational.”
This publication documents the power and impact of nearly 200 examples of AIDS educational posters from around the world and the social activism that continues to bring awareness to a disease without vaccine or cure. Lacher-Feldman describes the book as “a testament to the significance of the collection itself, as well as a tribute to the work of collector, the late Dr. Edward Atwater, who had the vision to build this vast collection to document the global AIDS pandemic as a social, cultural, medical, and artistic phenomenon.”
“Prevent AIDS. Use One,” ca. 1991, Boston, Mass. Created by Massachusetts Department of Public Health 
“Can You Get AIDS from a Drinking Fountain?” 1988, Toronto, Ontario, Canada Created by Ontario Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care 
From the Banana Boys series, 1983, Rochester, N.Y. Created by AIDS Rochester 
“Only Gay Men Get AIDS. Only Gay Men and Haitians Get AIDS. […] When Are You Going to Get It?” n.d., Atlanta, Georgia. Created by AIDS Atlanta
“Up Against the Wall serves both as the exhibition catalog for the upcoming show at the Memorial Art Gallery in March 2022. The book describes and talks about the collection in University of Rochester’s River Campus Libraries as a whole, which is over 8,000 posters strong,” said Lacher-Feldman, exhibitions and special projects manager, and is the curator of record for the AIDS Education Posters Collection.
Up Against the Wall: Art, Activism, and the AIDS Poster accompanies an exhibition of AIDS education posters at the Memorial Art Gallery of the University of Rochester, March 6–June 19, 2022. Register for the World AIDS Day event here.
More information, Rochester Institute of Technology Press (RIT Press) https://www.rit.edu/press/against-wall.
