In You Are Not Alone 16 contemporary artists from around the world will give their individual visions on the causes, consequences and current context of Aids, as well as ways of fighting it. The pieces presented offer a vision of Aids from the perspective of different countries on different continents that all experience the illness in one form or other.

The ArtAids Foundation will invite ten internationally acclaimed artists who don’t usually work on the subject of Aids to create specific pieces for the exhibition. The selected artists are: Deimantas Narkevicius (Lithuania), Latifa Echakhck (Morocco), Danh Vo (Vietnam), Christodoulos Panayiotou (Cyprus), Lorena Zilleruelo (Chile),  Elmgreen & Dragset (Denmark and Norway), Be Our Friend Studio (Thailand), Ohm Phanpiroj (Thailand) and  Pratchaya Phinthong (Thailand).

The new pieces will be presented with a selection of works recently included in the ArtAids collection by David Goldblat (South Africa), Otto Berchem (United States-the Netherlands), Sutee Junavichayanont (Thailand) and Juul Hondius (the Netherlands). The work of Matthew Darbyshire (United Kingdom), intended to provide a space for reflection about Aids, is presented at the end of the exhibition. A view of the illness by Pepe Espaliú, a Spanish artist who died from Aids in 1993, appears by way of an introduction.

BARCELONA

“YOU ARE NOT ALONE”

MIRÓ FOUNDATION

“You Are Not Alone” is a group exhibition organized by ArtAids, a private foundation that invites leading international artists to produce work dealing with AIDS. In Barcelona, the show consisted of work by 15 artists (almost all based in Europe) and included nine new commissions, with notable contributions from Elmgreen & Dragset, Deimantas Narkeviˇcius, the young Chilean artist Lorena Zilleruelo, Latifa Echakhch from Morocco and England’s Matthew Darbyshire. Covering the entire ground floor of the museum’s west wing, the exhibition aims to raise awareness of the discrimination faced by HIV/AIDS sufferers today, which it does in a quietly determined way.

In one of the first rooms, Elmgreen & Dragset’s roughly 10-by-4-foot, glaring white wall-hung neon sign reading (and titled) AIDS Is Good Business for Some provided light for New Blood (both 2011), their almost 7-foot-tall polyester resin and marble replica of the Barberini Faun, which was hooked up to an IV bag half-filled with blood. The hospital-like installation unmistakably takes a stab at the pharmaceutical industry for using the AIDS epidemic to unload high-priced medicine.

Zilleruelo’s 21-minute film Pasos (2011) documents the everyday life of a young HIV-positive Chilean woman. The camera follows her daily routine: from afternoon tango lessons to evening walks on the beach. Without melodrama, in an almost distanced way, the protagonist’s voiceover tells of her encounter with the man from whom she would later contract the deadly virus. Unspectacular but deeply moving, the narrative evolves from romantic love story to tragedy.

Though only indirectly addressing the AIDS theme, Narkeviˇcius’s film Restricted Sensation (2011) is an impressive production that tells the story of a theater director in the Soviet Union incarcerated for his homosexuality. In a sequence reminiscent of a scene in a Kafka novel, the main character finds himself abducted in the middle of the night by policemen and charged, without evidence or hope of a trial, for his sexual orientation. Although fictional, the film is based on the Lithuanian artist’s research into the prevalence of homophobia during Soviet times, a condition that persists in many Eastern European countries today.

[“You Are Not Alone” is on view at MARCO Museum, Vigo, Spain, through Jan. 22, 2012.]

—David Ulrichs

MARCO, Vigo, Speaks Out Against the Stigma of AIDS with You Are Not Alone

The ArtAids Foundation presents an exhibition on this illness seen through the eyes of 18 international artists

ÁGATHA DE SANTOS – VIGO

Yesterday, the Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Vigo (MARCO) embarked on its particular battle against the stigma of AIDS with You Are Not Alone, a group exhibition curated by Hilde Teerlincks and Irene Aristzábal that invites visitors to reflect on the social exclusion faced by AIDS sufferers, through the gaze of 18 international artists who don’t usually work on the subject of AIDS. Co-produced by MARCO, the ArtAids Foundation and the Fundació Miró, and sponsored by Banco Sabadell, You Are Not Alone aims to provoke visitor responses to AIDS and to the exhibition itself, and to contribute to shaping society’s perception of the illness.

“Art transmits ideas and feelings, in relation to the virus too. We’ve seen it happen in other exhibitions. People wonder: What is the artist trying to tell me? What does this work have to do with AIDS? This is what the Foundation tries to do,” explained its president Han Nefkens, a Dutch writer, collector and patron who has previously collaborated with MARCO in The Suspended Moment, a 2006 exhibition in which he presented a selection of works from his private collection. The president of ArtAids, which supports research geared towards developing a vaccine in Spain and sponsors a project that provides support for AIDS sufferers in Thailand, also drew attention to the fact that millions of people in the world still don’t have access to AIDS treatment, a situation that he called “unacceptable.”

Each artist contributes his or her particular gaze on AIDS, its causes and consequences, and the context of the virus today, although the curator Hilde Teerlincks pointed out that they all tackle issues such as stigma and death. “The exhibition also pays homage to the artist Pepe Espaliú who died of AIDS in the nineties, by presenting his videos, which we believed should be part of this show,” she said.

Aside from Espaliú, the artists who have created the 35 works in You Are Not Alone, which will be open until 22 January 2012, are Otto Berchem, Matthew Darbyshire, Latifa Echakhch, Elmgreen & Dragset, Leandro Erlich, David Goldblatt, Juul Hondius, Sutee Kunavichayanont, Deimantas Narkevicius, Shirin Neshat, Lucy + Jorge Orta, Christodoulos Panayiotou, Araya Rasdjarmrearnsook, Shirana Shahbazi, Danh Vo, Lawrence Weiner and Lorena Zilleruelo.

Han Nefkens (first on the right) shows one of the artworks to the mayor of Vigo, Abel Caballero, accompanied by the director of the Banco Sabadell Foundation, Miguel Molins, and the director of MARCO, Iñaki Martínez Antelo. // J. de Arcos

“I don’t believe in conspiracies; there is interest in an AIDS vaccine, but it is difficult”

Han Nefkens, who has been HIV positive for 24 years, opened an exhibition that deals with the illness.

Ana Baena – Vigo – 22-10-2011

Han Nefkens (Rotterdam, 1954) opened the group exhibition You Are Not Alone at MARCO yesterday. As president of the ArtAids Foundation, Nefkens promotes artistic actions as a means of raising social awareness in relation to AIDS. Through this exhibition and his own testimony, he seeks to transmit a clear message. In perfect Spanish, using plain language and with a certain gentleness he explained his legacy.

How does this exhibition raise public awareness in relation to AIDS?
Art has a great transformative power. An artwork is an image that stays in your mind, you dwell on it and it makes you think about HIV: the fact that it still exists, that it is important to be careful and take precautions, and to not exclude AIDS sufferers.

You acknowledged that you are HIV positive. How did you come to terms with the illness?
I found out 24 years ago, in Mexico. My initial reaction was denial: “It can’t be true, that’s not me.” It took me a while to accept it. In the late eighties, early nineties, it was a different story. I saw many people die of AIDS, my brother, friends. It was like witnessing the fate that was awaiting me too. From 1996, everything changed. New medicines came out, and hope grew. We went from living with urgency to making medium and long term plans

The exhibition is called “You Are Not Alone”. Did you ever feel alone?
I felt very much alone when I first found out. I was afraid of the reactions of my family, my partner, my friends. Then I learnt that if you make it clear that there is a difference between having a chronic illness and a terminal one, people understand.

One of the works in the exhibitions suggests that AIDS is a business. Is this debate taking place?
That’s the power of art, to open discussions. AIDS is good business for the pharmaceutical industry. But it is also the industry that developed the 20 pills that I take, which keep me alive. Without it, there would be no medicines. These companies invest huge amounts of money and they have a right to recover it. But we need to find a solution for those who don’t have access to them.

Why is it so difficult to come up with a vaccine?
I don’t believe in conspiracies. There are people interested in it; whoever discovers it will win a Nobel Prize and sell millions. But it is difficult because the virus mutates often.

The curator of the exhibition, Hilde Teerlinck, and Han Nefkens, with the work by Otto Berchem. Nefkens founded ArtAids in 2004 when he realised the power of art, which is part of his life as  an art collector who hangs his works in museums rather than at home.

MARCO presents an exhibition that offers of 18 perspectives on AIDS.

By: b.r.sotelino 22/10/2011

Following the successful exhibition by Martin Creed that flooded the ground floor of the Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Vigo with blue balloons, MARCO has cleared away the latex and filled the space with a new exhibition that also has prophylactic characteristics. The group exhibition You Are Not Alone brings together a total of 35 works by 18 contemporary artists from around the world (eight of which were specifically commissioned for this show), which offer an innovative way of looking at the cause, consequences and current context of HIV/AIDS, and at ways to fight the illness.

In the presentation, the director of MARCO, Iñaki Martínez, expressed his conviction that art can help to change the world, “or at least to make us better human beings.” The exhibition has been co-produced by the ArtAids Foundation, the Fundació Joan Miró (where the exhibition closed on September 18), and MARCO.

HIV-positive patron of the arts

One of the people present at the opening was Han Nefkens, president of the ArtAids Foundation. Nefkens is a collector and patron who carries out outstanding work as a promoter of artistic projects with a clear social purpose, particularly in regards to the fight against HIV/AIDS. The Dutch collector, who had previously collaborated with MARCO in 2006 when he loaned part of his personal collection for an exhibition, explained that his Foundation is dedicated to fighting the stigma of AIDS, “and as a HIV-positive person, I know what that means. It’s tough, and it can also be very dangerous, because 30% of those affected don’t know that they are. They don’t want to know because they are scared to be tested for fear of social exclusion,” he said. Nefkens added that he believes “in the power of art, which transmits ideas and feelings,” and he said that the illness has become invisible and exhibitions like this one help to make people think.

Very different visions

Hilde Teerlinck and Irene Aristizábal curated the exhibition. According to Teerlinck, the invited artists became strongly involved in the project, delving into the issue in order to learn more about it, and committing to a research project and a quest that lasted a year and a half. This process gave rise to a wide diversity of visions, depending on the part of the world on which each artist focused.

The exhibition, which will be open in Vigo until January 22, is sponsored by the Banco Sabadell Foundation, which is collaborating with a cultural project in Galicia for the first time, a gesture that the director of the foundation Miguel Molins assured would be repeated in the future. The director of the museum literally took him at his word, drawing attention to the fact that “we are at a moment in time when, as public institutions, we need the support of private entities.”

Curator Hilde Teerlinck and patron Han Nefkens in front of the work by Otto Berchem.

Photographer: fran g.- alegre

Fundació Joan Miró, Barcelona. 08-09-2011

His works has been shown in artspaces in South Africa and Europe. Selected exhibitions: Michael Stevenson Gallery, Woodstock – Cape Town (2009); …for those who live in it, MU project space, Eindhoven, The Netherlands (2010); Atri Reportage festival, Italy (2010); Us, Iziko South African National Gallery, Cape Town (2010) Afronova gallery, Braamfontein (2010), Short Change, Market Photo Workshop Gallery, Newtown – Johannesburg (2009).

http://www.musanxumalo.com

Caroline has most recently completed two further films “Chips and Liver Girls” and “Fire Fly” commissioned by The Danish Film Institute / DOX Lab and the Rotterdam International Film Festival. Both films were screened at the DOX Film Festival 2010 on Denmark and the Rotterdam Film Festival in Holland in 2011.

http://www.ivadproductions.com