SILENCE=DEATH was a project started in 1986 by six New Yorkers, Avram Finkelstein, Brian Howard, Oliver Johnston, Charles Kreloff, Chris Lione, and Jorge Socarrás, as a support system during the height of the AIDS crisis. Interested in spreading awareness, and inspired by art world activists, they created this poignant poster centered on a simple but loaded, reclaimed symbol. Historically, an upside down pink triangle badge was employed in Nazi concentrations camps to identify homosexual prisoners. The right side up pink triangle quickly became an icon of AIDS activism and was adopted by the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP), which is still active today.
Posted by Elizabeth Treptow SILENCE = DEATH Project (Avram Finkelstein, Brian Howard, Oliver Johnston, Charles Kreloff, Chris Li. SILENCE=DEATH, 1987. Offset lithograph, sheet: 33 9/16 × 21 15/16 in. (85.2 × 55.7 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Robert Thill in honor of Robin Renée Thill Beck, 1998.109. © artist or artist's estate #halfthepicturebkm
