In his chapter, “Blood and Sweat,” David Gere introduces different modes through which art and artists responded to, and intervened in, the AIDS epidemic. For this Moodle post, select one of these approaches to summarize for its intentions and cultural/social/political impact. Then, further develop this intervention by introducing us to another artwork/artist/event that engaged with this approach. [Note: You are welcome to research additional work that responds to AIDS, but do not need to in your elaboration. You may also consider other issues/movements that have used similar tactics.]
In your writing, you want to be considering what it is that art/artists can DO in the work that they create in the world, as well as what the work might mean.
In the chapter “Blood and Sweat” from How to Make Dances an Epidemic, David Gere explains how public protests are a type of performance; there is a choreographic element to the AIDS “Die-In” protests. The routine actions as well as the adaptations involved in the protests can be interpreted as choreographed interposition. Protesters enact the deaths of AIDS victims and outline themselves with white chalk. In pretending to be dead they make themselves an (very difficult) obstacle for the police to remove.
In the section labeled “Seize Control of the FDA,” Gere refers to the protests as “demonstrations [that aim] to symbolize the guilt that the U.S. medical community and government bureaucracy must bear for the deaths of tens of thousands” (p.63). By making the street their stage, protestors force the media, police, and public to witness their performances (demonstrations). Along with the manipulation of space, protestors also exploit time to create an emotional appeal for their audience. They dramatize the way their bodies hit the ground when they “die.” Every gesture a protestor makes becomes inherently symbolic as the occupied location becomes a stage.
The “Hands Up Don’t Shoot” Ferguson and Baltimore protests that resulted from the killing of Michael Brown and Freddie Gray can be analyzed under the framework developed by Gere. Raising one’s hands when in contact with the police has long been a routine action (choreographic in a perverse way) for people of color—especially black people—to demonstrate submission and innocence. The action became a part of the choreography of several protests against police brutality following the events of 2014.
It is the intent of the protestors to elicit sensations of guilt and shame from the police and government as they are confronted with waves of people presenting themselves in what is considered a vulnerable fashion. Signs also accompany “Hands Up Don’t Shoot” protests like the “SILENCE = DEATH” ones from the AIDS protests. Yet again, streets—places that have controlled routes of circulation—are transformed into stages for the performances of activists. Protests aim to disturb, and in Gere’s words: “[result] in a double anxiety: the fear of losing control coupled with the fear of death itself” (p.43). Bodies that surpass boundaries—be it by leaking fluids or merely being “out of bounds”—challenge figures of authority. Protestors weaponize their own (or other’s) anxieties and force them onto those that feel threatened. In the case of Act-Up and “Hands Up Don’t Shoot,” it is the loss of control and the potential of death.
Works Cited
Gere, David. “Blood and Sweat.” How to Make Dances in an Epidemic: Tracking Choreography in the Age of AIDS, University of Wisconsin Press, 2004, pp. 39-90.
