Never forgotten; Massive AIDS Quilt display set for Golden Gate Park during Pride Month
SAN FRANCISCO (CBS SF) -- The AIDS Memorial Quilt will mark its 35th anniversary with a monumental event during PRIDE month. Three thousand panels of the historic tapestry will be on display in Golden Gate Park at the Robin Williams Meadow.
This will be the biggest display of the Quilt ever seen in San Francisco and the biggest display nationwide in a decade.
The Quilt is a site to behold and the world's largest community art project. The tapestry is full of names and stories stitched, quilted, and affixed onto handmade panels. Each panel tells the story of a person who died from AIDS or AIDS-related causes.
"The reason we did it was because we were mad at the government," said Quilt co-founder Gert McMullin. "We're mad that our friends are dead, and I'm still mad my friends are dead."
"Just tragic, not only were we losing them, they were being forgotten," said Quilt co-founder Cleve Jones. "And I did not want them to be forgotten."
In 1985, Cleve got the idea during a candlelight march to commemorate the assassinations of then San Francisco Supervisor Harvey Milk and Mayor George Moscone. It all began with a bunch of poster boards, magic markers, and some big ladders stashed nearby.
"So that night as we marched," Cleve recalled. "I asked people to write the names of their neighbors, and friends, and loved ones who had been killed by AIDS. And we put these on placards and then we marched to the old federal building."
"We climbed up on big ladders and covered the grey stone façade of the building with this patchwork of names. I looked at it and thought it looks like some strange quilt. And I immediately thought of my grandma and my great grandma back in Bee Ridge, Indiana and the quilts that they'd sewn."
The AIDS Memorial quilt has grown from a few panels to more than 50,000 over the decades. It weighs roughly 54 tons and is overseen by the National AIDS Memorial.
About 3,000 panels from the permanent collection will be part of the upcoming event at Golden Gate Park on June 11th and 12th.
The weekend event is free of charge.
"All are invited it will be a happy joyous moment," said Matt who volunteers for the National AIDS Memorial. "We're all sort of coming out of hibernation from the pandemic."
The organizers are putting out the world, that anyone can create a new panel for the event. There are certain requirements for each one and you need to fill out some paperwork.
Quilt workshops will be held each Wednesday at 354 Castro Street in San Francisco from 3 to 6 pm.
Don't know how to sew? No worries - quilt volunteers will be on hand to give you some pointers.
"This struck me that this is the thing that I can do," said Quilt volunteer and workshop helper Michael Bongiorni. "I wasn't a politician, and I wasn't an activist like ACTUP like I could throw things at the FDA, and I wasn't a medical person, but I could teach people how to make things."
"I'm actually proud of the fact that I able to do it," said Roddy Williams to KPIX 5.
Williams made his first quilt in honor of his best friend Andrew. The quilt tells the story of Andrew: in one area, you'll see hand stitched quilted Scrabble tiles. The two friends played games like Scrabble on Sundays. Each tile spells out words that detail parts of Andrew's life: including "artist", "friend", and his nickname "Blue Boy".
Andrew's name is quilted onto the panel, replicating his signature, and using fabric from one of his favorite disco shirts. There is a huge curving orange panel on the right side which is connected to his fondness of Dr. Seuss. Also on the panel, a QR-code that when scanned with a visitor's smart phone, reveals many examples of Andrew's art work given to his friends.
Roddy is now working on his second panel to honor some musicians. Roddy loves music so the panel's focus will be on several musicians who have died of AIDS or AIDS-related causes, including Sylvester, Tom Fogarty, Freddie Mercury, and Sharon Redd.
The new panels will play a role in the event's closing ceremony and will become a permanent part of the historic quilt.
Its legacy involves the terrible mistakes made during the AIDS crisis. But the tapestry is also about the threads that connect us all.
"I think there's a deeper legacy which is the power of community the power of memory and the fact that people do love each other and do care for each other very much. And at a time of enormous suffering and great pain, people responded with love and beauty, and I think that's a marvelous thing," concluded Cleve.
Event:
https://www.aidsmemorial.org/quilt35
How to make a quilt panel
https://www.aidsmemorial.org/make-a-panel
National AIDS Memorial
