Retroactivism
GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies, Apr 1, v. 12, no. 2, p. 303
Duke University Press
Lucas Hilderbrand recounts a history of the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP) and offers am examination regarding his personal nostalgia/romanticizing/fascination of the movement. He looks at the significance of the rise of AIDS activism happening in tandem with the rise of accessible home video equipment, and notes that the organization was one of the first who used video-making as a tool to disseminate, document and educate. The article explores how the videos in ACT UP’s archive function to capture not only the political progress, but the emotion integral to the project. The author pulls from the archives, quoting prominent members who noted the contradictions and radicality of the movement. Hildebrand offers a discussion of affect, nostalgia and cultural memory and challenges the convention of looking at AIDS activism solely through the lens of trauma.
ITEM 2006.195 – available for viewing in the Research Centre
Videos, Artworks and Artists Cited
Fight Back, Fight AIDS: Fifteen Years of ACT UP (2002) – DIVA TV (Damned Interfering Video Activist Television)
Storm the NIH (1989) – James Wentzy
An Archive of Feelings – Tony Molinari
Video Remains (2005) – Ann Cvetkovich
Beyond Shame – Jim Hubbard
Fast Trip, Long Drop (1993) – Sarah Schulman
Alexandra Juhasz
Patrick Moore
Deborah B. Gould
Gregg Bordowitz
Jean Carlomusto