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The most supreme article on HIV/ AIDS from back in the day. Thank you Tibor Kalman for this #slick gem. Currently I am in the middle of laying out and designing my thesis book. I have fallen MADLY in love with the work of Tibor Kalman as a reference for what my book should look like. I love his work and it goes very closely with the aesthetic that I am trying to develop for myself.

http://www.colorsmagazine.com/magazine/7

DISCLOSIONAL the #experience

More photos to come!

Disclosional is a design experience about disclosure of HIV for Heath Wagoner's SVA Masters Thesis. Those who visit will have the opportunity to experience the stories of HIV positive people through spoken and written word, with contributions from multiple Visual...

How HIV treatment works- Body & Soul Charity

Manifesting controlled vocabulary.

In the past weeks I have been tasked with creating a controlled vocabulary for my thesis ( and avoiding posting to the blog...). The controlled vocabulary is the list of terms that are relevant to my thesis and that I understand the most. The goal of compiling this list is to make an appendix for those who will be interacting with my thesis. This list is meant to make their journey through my thesis easier to understand.

Below I have listed my controlled vocabulary as of now:

General

HIV

Human Immunodeficiency Virus

MSM

Men who have sex with Men

Disclosure

the act of announcing one’s status

Status

Postive

being HIV Positive

Negative-

Being HIV Negative

Serodiscordant

when one partner is HIV Positive and the other is HIV Negative.

Undetectable

having a viral load so low that it cannot be detected in an HIV test.

Bare-backing

having anal sex without a condom

HIV Treatment

PrEP

Pre Exposure Prophylaxis- a once daily pill that if adhered to is claimed to prevent the contraction of HIV

ARV

Anti retroviral a medication used to prevent the replication of HIV cells and reduce the viral load.

ART

Anti retroviral therapy, the therapy consists of the combination of at least three antiretroviral (ARV) drugs to maximally suppress the HIV virus and stop the progression of HIV disease.

PEP

Post Exposure Prophylaxis, a drug that if taken 24 hours after exposure to HIV eliminates the virus from occurring in the body.

Truvada

The drug that is currently used as PrEP

AZT

An older HIV drug that was one of the first FDA approved HIV Medications, known to have many adverse side effects.

HIV Slang

POZ

Slang for HIV positive

House in Virginia

referring to someone as being HIV positive

Hi5

refers to someone as being HIV positive.

PNP

Party and Play

"Hivvv"

Referring to HIV

The lexicon is broken into general words, status related terms, treatment terms, and HIV slang. For now these are the words that I have been using the most in my thesis. This week we dove into ontology and the importance of what it means when you use a word. My next task with this lexicon is to further break down the meanings of these words to an "alien dictionary" format. This means that if I encountered an alien who had never used any of these words, I would be able to help it understand what they mean.

Moving forward with this list I am going to create a poster with it. I would also try to incorporate it into some sort of manifesto. Below is an example of the successfully designed Holstee manifesto poster. Imagine how a lexicon might live in such a poster format.

Meeting with Visual Aids

A couple of weeks ago I had the honor and pleasure of meeting with notoveraids! I was able to fully understand how they work and how I could possibly do work with them.

Visual AIDS is a New York based non profit that uses art to bring attention to HIV/AIDS. They were one of the first organizations to document the impact of HIV on the artist community. In 1991 Visual AIDS Artist caucus created the Ribbon Project, resulting in the Red ribbon that has become synonymous with HIV. Visual AIDS also has the largest database of HIV positive artists as well as a database of artists producing work related to HIV.

Visual AIDS is also, in my opinion is the most well designed resource of the HIV community. I was lucky enough to receive some of their printed material, condom trading cards, and an amazing tote by @briankenny . The resources they presented were not only insightful, but also a great marker of where design should be for print.

The two books in the front "Stephen Andrews & Gregg Bordowitz in conversation" and "Chloe Dzubilo | Che Gosset & Alice O'Malley in conversation" are probably my favorite two books I got from my visit, not only for content but also for design.

I hope to work more closely with Visual AIDS in the future and contribute to the amazing work they are doing.

Icon map for a "1 hit kit" for the Lower East Side Harm Reduction Center

Shoot safe

#cleanneedlessavelives

Be wary of Infographics

This week we explored how some of our research might look as an infographic. I designed this infographic to address the urgency of the rise of HIV in today's millennial generation. I feel as if I am beginning to feel like a broken record, with this statistic I keep restating from the CDC. According to the CDC if current trends continue half of all educated gay men will have HIV by the time they are 50. This is a statistic that bares repeating! Thats one in every two! I know that HIV has become a chronic condition that people can live with for years, as long as they adhere to medications, but that is still no reason to give up the fight for a cure or protect your body.

The infographic that I designed above, while packed with information is a little overwhelming and can get a little confusing here is the breakdown of some of the things I did wrong:

While the infographic is successful it could have been simplified or broken into multiple graphics. LESS is MORE! The biggest takeaway from this was to architect my information before I put into a designed graphic.

Apps, Finger Pricks, and, Maps

This week after enjoying a lovely weekend out of the city with my boyfriend, I slaved away at my computer identifying the goals and objectives of my thesis. My goal as I have stated before is to find new ways for HIV positive men to disclose their status in hopes of preventing further infections. The objectives to achieve this goal are to create an app that is a platform for disclosure and to create an at home testing device that connects to the app through a smart phone.

After reviewing my paper with my classmate Brandon Washington, he like my friend Nico showed the most interest in the app. He really liked the opportunity I have with disclosure specifically my statement "By exploring disclosure I have an opportunity to really understand how people do or do not talk." This is extremely relevant to the gay community or lack there of. It is important that I explore how we are not talking to each other as a community to understand how we are not talking to our partners or selves about disclosure.

As far as the at home testing device, its been done.... kinda. Earlier this week engineering students at Columbia University released the "dongle" It is a finger prick HIV 15 minute rapid tester that is reusable, affordable, and plugs into a smart phone. I am very interested to see what this technology has to offer and to find ways of collaboration.

Moving on from that I plan to start wireframing an app that would act as a platform for disclosure. So far people have presented a great deal of interest in such an app and I hope still that it would be able to pair with a device like Dongle or my own design.

Later in class we mapped the Needs, Context, Channels, and, Factors of our thesis. We had to put a persona through this journey map and figure out what they needed, why they would use our service, how they would find out about our service, and the factors that might help or hinder the use of our product of service.

Finally yesterday was the reveal of a very shocking number that has since dwindled by one today. It is in case you have not already figured it out, The number of days left in our graduate careers. That number is:

Hiding behind Metal and Making.

This week we had the assignment of creating something that represented the work we intend to present along with a short statement about the object. In a run away aversion to my thesis, reacted with jewelry-like art.

The work that I am intending to make for my thesis is so different from that I comfortable with. I am used to making things out of metal and adding a high polish. This is great if I want to make something for the fashion industry. What I really want to make is a platform for disclosure of HIV as a preventative tool, along with an at home testing device.

This is the piece that I created to hide behind.

The disclosure device is an intimate speculative object for two. While one end houses a speaker for the person disclosing to speak into, the other end is half an ear piece. Its stethoscope meets megaphone. There is only half the listening device so that the reacting half can listen to both the disclosure of the first person while still having an open ear to society.

While it is aesthetically pleasing as an art object, it does nothing for disclosing HIV or preventing it. This was however a great experience in the power of our minds and hands to mask what we are afraid of.

My main goal is create a platform (most likely digital), for HIV disclosure, not a series of objects.

With marriage equality imminent, few social issues affect the entire group equally.

HIV rates are rising!

Mapping out the Direction of my Thesis

This week were tasked with mapping out the direction of our thesis. I feel like my classes are bleeding into one another, because we seem to be constantly mapping the state or system of our thesis. This week though was extremely helpful in thesis because I was able to appropriately voice my fears of my thesis. Whether it was the fear of my thesis falling short, making art, or me still being viewed as a jeweler it all came out.

We worked in groups of 3 where two recorded the words you said that decribed your thesis. You can see from the diagram above, where my thesis currently is, what I intend to do with it, and where I feel I was at the time of my defense.

I included art and jeweler on there because I am terrified of being viewed as either. I want to be viewed as a designer. This is something I struggled with even in undergrad. I always thought it undermined my craft when people would refer to me as an artist. I feel the same when people now refer to me as a jeweler, I want to be considered a well rounded designer, not a one trick pony.

#thesis #notart

This a prime example of reimagining how we experience scent!

The Power of Scent

This week in Design Delight I explored my daily ritual that most pertains to my thesis. The most delightful part to my daily routine in the AM is the application of cologne to my wrist and neck. I feel that it shelters me from bad smells, while presenting my scent to the world. I was told that I must storyboard my routine and then present it to multiple users, getting them to partake in the ritual without being told what to do.

Below is the storyboard after I formated it for the computer.

I then took the experiment to my whole class by having them all apply one of five scents I had provided for them. Some of my classmates did not spray themselves with it for the fear of commitment that comes with walking around in someone else's scent for the day. Others did apply the scent, with one even saying that he reapplied later in the day and that it made him feel fresh and more energized for the day and evening.

I am very interested though in the fear of commitment. This follows along with how people who interact with people with diseases like HIV often forgo a relationship or close interaction because of the fear of commitment that comes with avoiding transmission. Through fragrance I seek to explore how people might use smell to better inform their decisions and how it could be used to make disclosure easier.

The application of the smell will also be important in this exploration. Does it need to remain in the spray form that we are all so familiar with? Or must it evolve into something like a wearable such as a patch?

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