12 of Our Favorite HIV/AIDS Posters

By Jacob Anderson-Minshall

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Silence=Death ACT UP Poster

ACT UP (The AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power) used in-your-face guerilla activism to raise

awareness about AIDS and fight the stigma associated with it. This classic poster asks in small

print, why President Reagan, the FDA, the CDC and the Vatican remained silent in the face of

the deadly epidemic. “Gays and lesbians are not expendable!” it declared, in a time (the 1980’s)

when it seemed our country believed LGBT people were indeed expendable.

 AIDS Causes Blindness AIDS Action Committee Poster

New England’s AIDS Action Committee made this poster, which features a group of protesters

Holding signs about keeping AIDS out of the workplace. Although people with living with the

Complications of AIDS could lose their sight, the poster suggests it is people banning poz

Individuals from the workplace are really the blind ones.

Soon Everyone Will Know Someone Who Doesn’t Know They’re Poz

The National HIV Awareness Day poster reminds us that many of those who are

HIV-positive don’t know it. One more reason to support routine HIV testing.

Controversial Canadian ‘Working Conditions’ Poster by AIDS Action Now

Canadian activist Ryan Conrad produced several controversial posters in response

To that country’s Supreme Court Ruling around disclosure and HIV criminalization.

This 2012 poster, made for AIDS Action Now, revolves around male sex work, showing a man

giving another man a rim-job and listing “exposure, disclosure, stigma, and criminalization.”

Large print proclaims these “working conditions.” When images of the poster were shared on

Social networking sites, conservative backlash go the project’s page completely removed by

Facebook for violating “community standards.” Check out more HIV/AIDS posters from around

the world here.

 

Read my Lips Gran Fury Poster

In the 1980’s, the activist group ACT UP featured a number of Kiss-ins; yes public displays of

affection from queers was once shocking (and political). Since it was widely  –  and mistakenly  

–  believed that kissing could pass HIV, such kiss ins were also HIV awareness and stigma-busting campaigns. Gran Fury, an offshoot of ACT UP, created this poster from a graphic of two

sailors kissing with the slogan “Read My Lips.” According to Focus Features, “While many read

the two sailors as an artifact of secret World War ll desires, the actual image…was a bit of

anonymous gay porn dug up from the Kinsey archives. Ironically the expression, the same

year (1988), George Bush made “Read My Lips” part of his presidential campaign, giving a whole

other dimension to the poster.

Kissing Doesn’t Kill ACT UP Poster

This iconic poster from ACT UP even made it onto the side of a few buses. Featuring gay,

lesbian, and straight couples it reads: “Kissing Doesn’t Kill: Greed and Indifference do.”

None of These Will Give You AIDS – IL AIDS Hotline Poster

From the Illinois AIDSHotline this poster makes it clear that you can’t get HIV from shaking

hands, sharing dishware, using the toilet, or touching a door handle. Too bad we still hear

from people who think these things will give them HIV.

  XOXO National Women and Girls HIV/AIDS Awareness Day Poster

 

This 2016 poster for NationalWomen and Girls HIV/AIDS Awareness Day uses

condoms in place of O’s in XOXO and offers this year’s motto “A good offense is the

best defense.” Good advice on the 25^th anniversary of this female-focused awareness day.

 

Ignorance=Fear Silence=Death Keith Haring Poster

The fabulous artist Keith Haring made this poster for ACT UP. It features the street artist’s

Iconic style; stand-ins for the See-No-Evil, Hear-No-Evil, and Speak-No-Evil monkeys; and the

Mottos: Ignorance=Fear and Silence=Death. 

AIDSGate ACT UP Poster

President Nixon had Watergate, ACT UP activists wanted President Reagan to be remembered

For AIDSGate, for his scandalous refusal to address the epidemic. 

Play Safe

Using colored condoms as replacements for Olympic Rings, Grady Health Systems distributed

this 1995 safer sex poster at the Atlanta Games. (Read more about how it came to be – and the

fall out – here.) 

From Edward Atwater’s AIDS Poster Collection

This is one of more than 8,000 HIV/AIDS posters spanning 30 years and 100 plus countries

that  Dr. Edward Atwater, professor emeritus of medicine at the University of Rochester Medical

Center, donated to the library’s department of Rare Books and Special Collections. Check out

some of the most iconic AIDS posters from what is likely the largest collection in the world,

here. 

©  University of Rochester Libraries

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