From histories of harm reduction and prison activism to the long-term effects of HIV medication and stigma, the commissioned videos center stories of collective care, mutual aid, and solidarity that recast community work as a form of medicine. The program disrupts the assumption that an epidemic can be solved with pharmaceuticals alone, pointing to corrupt leadership within government and non-profit organizations as well as broader racial and gender inequities that persist despite scientific advances.
Video Synopses
Topher Campbell, Encounters
Encounters weaves together a narrative from the intersecting relationships of Black folks navigating sex and sexual health, using the ubiquitous swipe of dating apps as a formal device to traverse the African diaspora in London.
Katherine Cheairs, Voices at the Gate
Voices at the Gate is an experimental documentary video juxtaposing the bucolic landscapes inhabited by women’s prisons with archival and contemporary audio recordings of poems, essays and interviews by current and formerly incarcerated women of color living with HIV and AIDS.
Cristóbal Guerra, Palma Tilteá
Ser cuerpe y ritual en la simulación caribeña.
Being body and ritual inside the Caribbean simulation.
Danny Kilbride, The Mersey Model
Danny Kilbride interviews Professor John Ashton, a public health official who helped institute the Mersey Model of Harm Reduction in Liverpool in 1986, the first government-funded needle exchange program in the UK.
Abdul-Aliy A. Muhammad, #Medstrike: Confronting the Non-Profit Industrial Complex
Abdul-Aliy A. Muhammad chronicles their 2017 medication strike against the Mazzoni Center, an LGBT health clinic in Philadelphia, and the direct action campaign by the Black and Brown Workers Cooperative that preceded it.
Beto Pérez, In the Future
In the Future tells the stories of people living with HIV in Mexico who have been unable to access treatment because of government corruption and widespread theft and looting of medication.
Steed Taylor, I am... a Long-Term AIDS Survivor
Through a chorus of voices, Steed Taylor explores the difficulties of being a long-term AIDS survivor and the unexpected health problems facing many senior survivors.
J Triangular, The Women’s Video Support Project
A collaborative video project made with women living in Taiwan who use their cameras to process stress and stigma, and to share their experiences living with HIV.