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Silence = Death [AIDS]

1987. Colour lithograph, 84 x 55.2cm. Minor handling creases. Linen-backed.

Text continues “Why is Reagan silent about AIDS? What is really going on at the Center for Disease Control, the Federal Drug Administration, and the Vatican? Gays and lesbians are not expendable, use your power, vote, boycott, defend yourselves, turn anger, fear, grief into action. Copyright 1987 AIDS Coalition To Unleash Power [ACT UP].”

This poster was designed by six gay men, Avram Finklestein, Brian Howard, Oliver Johnston, Charles Kreloff, Chris Lione, and Jorge Soccaras, who later joined the ACT UP aids activist organisation. In 1987 they formed the Silence = Death Project and “began plastering posters around the city [NY], featuring a pink triangle on a black background.” The pink triangle was “established as a pro-gay symbol by activists in the United States during the 1970s.” It was originally used by the Germans during WWII to identify known homosexuals in concentration camps. Ref: ACT UP NY.

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Item #CL193-152

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