AIDS quilt
Fabric epidemic remembrance
The AIDS quilt, formally the NAMES Project AIDS Memorial Quilt, is a massive patchwork memorial commemorating people who died from AIDS-related causes.
Begun in 1987, it consists of thousands of individual panels, each roughly the size of a grave, created by friends and family members.
The quilt serves as both mourning ritual and activist symbol, making visible the scale of the epidemic: They unfolded the AIDS quilt on the National Mall.
- memorialThing preserving remembrance
- National MallFederal parkland between memorials
- panelsFlat rectangular sections
- namesPersonal identifying words
- remembranceAct of holding something in mind
HIV · activism · grief · sewing · fabric · loss · epidemic · safe sex · Washington · display · stitching · patches · sewn together · victims · community · commemoration · handmade · tribute
- AIDS activismACT UP, red ribbon, HIV testing, awareness campaign, candlelight vigil
- HIV/AIDSHIV, antiretrovirals, HIV testing, viral load, HIV test
AIDS quiltunmarked grave
Burial site without identification
mass grave · erasure · silence · anonymity · oblivion
AIDS quiltcase numbers
Count of documented instances
victim-blaming · stigmatization · moral judgment · tabloid coverage · societal stigma
AIDS, quilt, aid, aided, aiding, aids, quilts, quilted, quilting