AIDS Is Everyday / January

AIDS is an everyday experience. The dates on this calendar all relate to the AIDS crisis. Some are globally known; others are drawn from personal experiences.

This online calendar is produced in partnership with Visual AIDS and is an extension of the exhibition “EVERYDAY,” which was curated by Jean Carlomusto, Alexandra Juhasz and Hugh Ryan in 2016. The exhibition and accompanying print calendar explored the AIDS crisis—historically and currently—through the lens of art and ephemera that examines and evidences daily experiences and practices in response to HIV/AIDS. Artists featured in the “EVERYDAY” exhibition were invited to submit as many dates to the calendar as they desired.

We invite you to reflect upon these dates, and this artwork, in dialogue with one another. We also encourage you to submit dates of your own by clicking here. Submissions may include the date of your diagnosis, the date of the loss of a loved one to AIDS-related illness or a significant milestone in your life with HIV/AIDS.

New submissions will be continually added to the calendar because AIDS is not over.

JANUARY 1

Ward 86, the world’s first dedicated outpatient AIDS clinic, opens at San Francisco General Hospital. (1983)

Established to advocate for global action to combat the epidemic and to coordinate HIV/AIDS efforts across the U.N. system, the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) commences operations. (1996)

It is no longer a felony in California to knowingly expose or transmit HIV to a sexual partner. The new law signed by Governor Jerry Brown lowers the offense to a misdemeanor with a maximum of six months in jail. Previously, a person could face up to eight years in prison if found guilty. The law also changes the penalty for knowingly donating HIV-positive blood from a felony to a misdemeanor. (2018)

JANUARY 2

JANUARY 3

ACT UP stages action in Albany to protest New York State’s lack of attention to the AIDS epidemic. (1990)

JANUARY 4

Gay Men’s Health Crisis, now known as GMHC, becomes the first community-based AIDS service provider. (1982)

The United States officially ends its 22-year ban on travel into the country by foreigners living with HIV. (2010)

JANUARY 5

DIVA TV inaugurates AIDS Community Television, a weekly television series and media network for AIDS activism. (1993)

Nelson Mandela announces that his eldest son has died of AIDS-related illness. (2005)

JANUARY 6

World-renowned ballet dancer Rudolf Nureyev dies of AIDS-related complications. (1993)

HIV/AIDS activist Jeff Sheehy is named to San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors representing District 8, making him the first person living with HIV to serve as a supervisor. (2017)

AIDS Is Everyday launches on POZ.com. (2017)

JANUARY 7

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports the first two cases of AIDS among females whose male partners had the disease, suggesting HIV could be transmitted via heterosexual sex. (1983)

JANUARY 8

First of two days of ACT UP demonstrations demanding the immediate repeal of Georgia’s sodomy laws. (1990)

JANUARY 9

Felix Gonzales-Torres dies of AIDS-related complications. (1996)

JANUARY 10

JANUARY 11

The CDC revises AIDS definition to note newly identified virus and issues provisional guidelines for blood screening. (1985)

JANUARY 12

President Barack Obama addresses HIV in his final State of the Union Address. “Right now, we’re on track to end the scourge of HIV/AIDS.” (2016)

JANUARY 13

Artist Joyce McDonald diagnosed HIV positive. (1995)

JANUARY 14

Artist darkroom danny diagnosed HIV positive. (2014)

JANUARY 15

The Women’s Caucus of ACT UP New York stages its first protest. It targets a Cosmopolitan magazine article by Robert E. Gould, MD, that claims women are not at risk for HIV. (1988)

ACT UP Philly interrupts Pennsylvania Governor Bob Casey’s inauguration demanding more attention to AIDS issues. (1991)

Director Ira Sachs’s FILM Last Address premieres at Sundance. It uses images of the exteriors of the houses, apartment buildings and lofts where artists such as Keith Haring, Robert Mapplethorpe, Peter Hujar, Cookie Mueller and Klaus Nomi were living at the time of their death to mark the disappearance of a generation. (2010)

JANUARY 16

The Ryan White Story airs on television. (1989)

JANUARY 17

Lifebeat: Music Fights HIV/AIDS and the MTV Staying Alive Foundation join forces to create the interactive art installation The Arches of Hope, in the lobby of the OUT Hotel in New York City. Designed by architect Antonio Pio Saracino, the installation consists of three 10-foot-tall arches representing three decades of HIV/AIDS. (2013)

A $17 million settlement is awarded in a federal class action lawsuit against Aetna after the insurer’s mailing revealed HV information of approximately 12,000 customers in at least 23 states. (2018)

JANUARY 18

The CDC reports the possible transmission of HIV to a patient through a dental procedure performed by a dentist who is HIV positive. (1990)

The FDA approves Intelence (etravirine). (2008)

JANUARY 19

ACT UP/NY Housing Committee meets with Mayor Koch’s housing advisor to discuss lack of AIDS housing in NY. (1989)

JANUARY 20

HIV activist and UNAIDS staffer Eric Sawyer carries the Olympic flame in Calgary, Canada, as part of the 2010 Olympic Torch Relay. (2010)

JANUARY 21

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) for people exposed to HIV, saying treatment should start no more than 72 hours after a person has been exposed to the virus. (2005)

The documentary Quiet Heroes, the story of a lesbian couple’s fight against stigma, shame and ignorance through the height of the AIDS crisis in Salt Lake City, premieres at the Sundance Film Festival. (2018)

JANUARY 22

ACT UP/New York activists enter the CBS Evening News studio and shout “AIDS is news—Fight AIDS, not Arabs” during the opening broadcast. (1991)

The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria is established as a partnership between governments, civil society organizations, the private sector and affected communities designed to accelerate the end of AIDS. (2002)

JANUARY 23

ACT UP declares a Day of Desperation demanding that everyone realize that every day is a day of desperation for those in the AIDS community. Demonstrations are organized throughout NYC. (1991)

Project Inform founder and longtime AIDS activist Martin Delaney dies of liver cancer at age 63. (2009)

The documentary film Fire in the Blood, which shows how pharmaceutical companies block access to low-cost HIV drugs in developing countries, premieres at the Sundance Film Festival. It is released in theaters later that year, on September 7. (2013)

The documentary Larry Kramer in Love & Anger premieres at the Sundance Film Festival. In June, it airs on HBO. (2015)

JANUARY 24

Felix Gonzales Torres’ lover, Ross Laycock, dies of AIDS-related complications. (1991)

Artist John Hanning is diagnosed HIV positive. (1995)

Avram Finkelstein forms The Fuck Laws Flash Collective at Concordia University in Montreal to create a billboard about HIV criminalization. (2014) 

JANUARY 25

The New York Times reports that more than 100,000 Americans have died of AIDS-related causes. (1991)

The musical Rent opens at the New York Theatre Workshop, the same day Jonathan Larson, its author and composer, dies. (1996)

JANUARY 27

A doctor informs artist John Hanning that he has six months to live. He survives. (1995)

JANUARY 28

President George W. Bush announces the establishment of PEPFAR to address AIDS, across the globe, specifically in Africa, in his State of the Union address. (2003)

JANUARY 29

The FDA approves Evotaz, a combination of atazanavir and cobicistat. (2015)

JANUARY 30

JANUARY 31

AIDS protesters from the group Stop AIDS Now or Else shut down the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco during the morning rush hour to demand that the government take faster action to stop HIV/AIDS. (1989)

Angelina Jolie stars in the television film Gia, about the life of supermodel Gia Carangi, who died of AIDS-related causes at age 26. (1998)

The exhibition Gran Fury: Read My Lips opens at 80 Washington Square East and features the work of the AIDS activist art collective. (2012)

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About the Artwork

This book was part of a series of projects about AIDS that Louie did after he was diagnosed, and are broadly autobiographical. A theme of the books is the fragility of the body and the medications used to sustain it. Another theme is sight, vision, seeing—lenses and magnifying glasses and glass marbles—and the need to orient oneself in the world, find one’s place (symbolized by the compasses, the tiny glass bottle with a sailboat in it, the bottle with a seashell, the bottle with a tiny pair of dice, the plumb bob).

– Eve Sinaiko, friend of Gin Fong Louie

Founded in 1988, Visual AIDS is the only contemporary arts organization fully committed to raising AIDS awareness and creating dialogue around HIV issues today, by producing and presenting visual art projects, exhibitions, public forums and publications—while assisting artists living with HIV/AIDS. Visual AIDS is committed to preserving and honoring the work of artists with HIV/AIDS and the artistic contributions of the AIDS movement.

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