Visual AIDS: Last Address Tribute Walk
Saturday, August 29, 2015
Beatrice Theatre
3:00 pm
Event hosted by: Visual AIDS
Event hosted by: School of Visual Arts
IN TRIBUTE TO ARTISTS WHO DIED OF HIV/AIDS AT THEIR LAST ADDRESSES.
Starting with a screening of Ira Sachs’ touching Last Address (2010, 9 min.) at SVA Theatre, the event will move to the streets of Chelsea where Visual AIDS Programs Manager Alex Fialho will lead a tribute walk honoring artists lost to AIDS. At each stop of an artist’s last residential address, a drawing by Win Mixter and rose will be left in tribute, and a special guest will share a reading related to the artist. Audio clips from Félix González-Torres, Vito Russo, Robert Mapplethorpe, Tseng Kwong Chi, and Chloe Dzubilo will also be played at SVA Theatre to bring each artist’s presence into the room.
In a spirit of lively remembrance, Alejandro Cesarco will read at the last address of Félix González-Torres (London Terrace, 405-465 W 23rd St); Larry Mass will read at the last address of Vito Russo (401 W 24th St); Pamela Sneed will read at the last address of Assotto Saint (360 W 22nd St); Kristoffer Haynes will read at the former address of Tseng Kwong Chi (162 W 21 St); Carl George will read at the last address of Hugh Steers (208 W 23rd St); a reading will take place at the last address of Robert Mapplethorpe (35 W 23rd St); and a reading will take place at the last address of Chloe Dzubilo (Prince George Ballroom).
Though these may be the last addresses where each artist lived, the life of their work continues to address, inspire, and live with a new generation today. The constellation of readings and roses, drawings and doorsteps of the tribute walks is a site for community based on both remembrance and response.
Artist Member pages for those we will tribute: Félix González-Torres, Robert Mapplethorpe, Tseng Kwong Chi, Hugh Steers and Chloe Dzubilo
***rain or shine***
Read about the Last Address Tribute Walk from two years ago on the Visual AIDS blog.
This event is free and open to the public. Seating at SVA Theatre is first-come, first-served.
READER’S BIOGRAPHIES
Carl George is a collagist, filmmaker and curator. Hugh and Carl were best friends, art collaborators, sisters on the dancefloor and brothers in arms in the war on AIDS.
Robert-Kristoffer Haynes was Tseng Kwong Chi’s domestic partner and assistant/ frequent trusted collaborator from 1983 until his passing in 1990.
Lawrence D. Mass, M.D., was the first to write about AIDS for the press and is a co-founder of Gay Men’s Health Crisis. He has written widely on AIDS, gay health, medicine and culture. He is the author of a memoir, Confessions of a Jewish Wagnerite; Being Gay and Jewish in America, and the editor of an anthology, We Must Love One Another or Die: The Life and Legacies of Larry Kramer. He works in addiction medicine in New York City, where he lives with his life partner, Arnie Kantrowitz, who was Vito Russo’s closest friend. Together with their other closest friend, Jim Owles, Arnie, Vito and Larry became an extended family as the AIDS epidemic unfolded.