Since the start of the global AIDS/HIV epidemic in the 1980’s, dance studio barres, marley floors, and stage lights have felt the loss of countless choreographers and dancers. Influential figures such as Hideyuki Yano, Arnie Zane, Dominique Bagouet, Jorge Donn, and Rudolf Nureyev have taken their final bow due to their HIV/AIDS diagnoses. Creating a rupture not of applause but of grief, felt not only within the dance community but by audiences at large. Despite this collective mourning, many choreographers took their sadness and anger to the stage, putting on performances to de-stigmatize the realities of HIV and AIDS victims. In doing so, the dance world embodied the political philosophy of Angela Davis, a renowned Black feminist theorist, abolitionist, and former member of the Black Panther Party, who argues in her book Freedom is a Constant Struggle, that activism must remain accessible, emotionally grounded, and rooted in shared communal bonds. Thus, this paper will argue that art can sustain and accelerate HIV/AIDS advocacy through performance and collective action.
When the first cases of HIV/AIDS appeared in the USA in the early 1980s, the dance community in France did not foresee the devastation ahead. As the AIDS/HIV epidemic progressed, many choreographers saw the profound impacts it had on the way dancers moved and how their physical appearances changed. Unfortunately, this led to many performers having to stop dancing entirely and choreographers having to adapt to these shifts while simultaneously mobilizing for political action. For example, in 1998, just after the peak of new HIV infections Alain Buffard created Good Boy, a groundbreaking piece creating shockwaves in Paris’ artistic scene in which “[Buffard’s] slow, clinical, uneroticized body was both burdened and bare, utterly defeated by the shortcomings of the medical and political response to HIV/AIDS.” Later in the 2000s, a growing body of work began to interweave narratives of the epidemic with broader geopolitical events and evolve understandings of gender identity. In doing so, these works created spaces not only to engage with and learn from the experiences of those affected by HIV/AIDS, but also to reshape and complicate the intersecting stories through which the epidemic is understood.
Alain Buffard’s Good Boy, as well as his works created after the 2000s, demonstrate one of Angela Davis’ core ideas surrounding activism and collective action: accessibility. On page 47 of her book Freedom is a Constant Struggle, she says “movements are most powerful when they begin to affect the vision and perspective of those who do not necessarily associate themselves with the movement”. Choreographers and artists achieve this by welcoming audiences into their personal lives through the pieces they put on about AIDS/HIV. Those buying tickets may or may not be aware of the impact AIDS/HIV has had on the dance community, but once the curtains close, it is certain they will walk away with a newfound relation to the epidemic, which was rare given the immense amount of stigma surrounding AIDS and HIV from professionals and society alike. Therefore, by translating political urgency into emotionally-charged performances, choreographers transform abstract policy, academic articles, and intimate struggles into real experiences that audiences could feel through their bodies. Further, these embodied experiences are immensely important as they destabilize the distance many people maintain from the epidemic, making it harder to dismiss, ignore, or depersonalize the ongoing harm faced by those living with HIV/AIDS. This emotional accessibility is crucial for accelerating and sustaining AIDS/HIV advocacy, helping audiences see beyond misconceptions and empathize with those facing the epidemic directly. As ongoing discrimination demonstrates, “despite legal protections and some reduction in the ignorance and fear about HIV, people in the United States are still denied and fired from jobs, kicked out of residences, ordered to limit contact with family, and discriminated against in many other ways because they have HIV.” Empathizing with those affected is essential not only for dismantling stigma, but for building the collective responsibility needed to support policy change, resource allocation, and the cultural shifts necessary to ensure people with HIV/AIDS can live with dignity and without fear.
Written By: Victoria Ormiston
Edited By: Alexandra MacNaughton
Disclaimer: This is an article written by a Staff Writer. Catalyst is a student-led platform that fosters engagement with global issues from a learning perspective. The opinions expressed above do not necessarily reflect the views of the publication.
As part of the World AIDS Day initiative and in partnership with Catalyst, the First Year Council of the International Development Studies Association presents “First Year Voices,” a space for IDS students to share their reflections on global health and justice.