HIV/AIDS in Photography: A Day With HIV

from Sao Paulo, Brazil, 11:00 am

In my last post about photography and HIV/AIDS, I wrote about the power of photography coming out of the community - representing the most intimate insight possible, in the most truthful way. Yesterday I came across a project that takes on this approach, and takes it to a new level: A Day With HIV, presented by Positively Aware magazine, assembles snapshots, self-portraits and other pictures from HIV+ people and their allies, telling the story of living with HIV.
Most pictures that we see today, which were taken "in the community" have been made by professional, trained photographers - such as Albert J. Winn or Nan Goldin. In A Day With HIV, however, everyone who can access a digital camera or a smartphone can participate and submit their "best shot against HIV". The result is a strikingly versatile gallery of pictures, all taken on 21st September 2013, organised by the time of day they were taken at. There are happy families and cute pets, people at leisure and at work - and the people's drugs, people hiding their faces; and there are personal accounts below every picture.

Ji Wallace, Sydney, Australia, 11:30 am

Documentary Photography is so much about giving "power to the people" - it is nice to see a project taking this so literally like A Day With HIV. It is, in a way, the ultimate representation of what it means to live with the infection. A Day With HIV, as every project that includes giving people cameras and voices rather than taking pictures of them and writing about them, is believable and authentic - and it serves its purpose wonderfully: to make people outside the community relate and understand, to open eyes, to fight the stigma. Aesthetes may snub the snapshot look, the pixelated pictures, the content-before-look approach. But in the days of internet, iPhones and selfies, we all should be used to pictures like those presented in the gallery. I, for my part, find the project quite interesting and enjoyable. As so often with HIV: You need to look beyond the surface, beyond the first impression, and you'll be surprised to find bubbling and bursting life.

Damone Thomas, Kingston, Jamaica, 1:45 pm

Gregory Costa, Maisons Laffitte, France, 11:00pm