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Learn MoreJanuary 20 - December 15, 2024
In Ellen Johnson Gallery
January 20 - December 15, 2024
In Ellen Johnson Gallery
Contemporary artists have adopted Christian motifs in a wide range of contexts explored here, from civil rights to global trade. Amid the HIV/AIDS outbreak in the 1980s, artists drew upon the emotional impact and recognizability of Christian imagery to promote awareness of the crisis and cope with grief in its wake. The adjacent presentations concerning Christianity and HIV/AIDS seen here may be experienced individually and in conversation with one another.
The overlap among these two subjects is a selection of works by queer Christian artists whose religious backgrounds and exposure to the ravages of AIDS provided a unique set of tools to express resilience and loss. Although each work confronts unique concerns, the works also respond to shared themes, including judgment, shame, guilt, suffering, martyrdom, plague, death, redemption, resurrection, salvation through blood, and the sacredness of wounded bodies.
AIDS is a topic broader and more global than the largely gay-male and U.S.-based roster of artists presented here would indicate. Yet these artists offered some of the most prominent responses to the damaging introduction of AIDS as a “gay cancer.” Likewise, artists who make use of Christian narratives are not all Christian and do not speak on behalf of the Church. Taken together, however, these works offer enduring models for turning pain and anger into love.
The exhibition is dedicated to the memory of William “Bill” Olander (1950–1989), curator and acting director of the Allen from 1979–1984, and co-founder of the artist-activist organization Visual AIDS.
Images:
Installation views, The Body, the Host: HIV/AIDS and Christianity. January 20–December 15, 2024.
Audrey Flack (American, 1931–2024), Macarena Esperanza, 1972, Fund for Contemporary Art, 1973.39.
Keith Haring (American, 1958–1990), Untitled, 1982–83, Gift of Rick Kantor (OC 1975) in honor of Minerva Durham's Drawing Class, 2021.31.2.
Jess T. Dugan (American, b. 1986), Dee Dee Ngozi, 55, Atlanta, GA 2016, from the portfolio To Survive on This Shore: Photographs and Interviews with Transgender and Gender Nonconforming Older Adults, 2018. Archival pigment print. Richard Lee Ripin Art Purchase Fund, 2019.7.11A.
Ellen Johnson ’33 Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art
February 15, 2024 at 12:15 p.m.
Join us in the exhibition The Body, the Host: HIV/AIDS and Christianity to hear Michael Roman, Assistant Professor of Studio Art a...
April 4, 2024 at 5:30 p.m.
Watch Recording This presentation will discuss ways to reevaluate traditional Catholic art and ceremony from a personal perspec...
April 13, 2024 at 11:00 a.m.
In this day of connection and reflection, we explore the healing power of art in the wake of collective trauma. Listen to a progra...
November 15, 2024 at 5:30 p.m.
This symposium, held in conjunction with the exhibition The Body, the Host: HIV/AIDS and Christianity, brings together artists, ac...
November 16, 2024 at 10:30 a.m.
This symposium, held in conjunction with the exhibition The Body, the Host: HIV/AIDS and Christianity, brings together artists, ac...
April 3, 2024 at 5:00 p.m.
Location: StudiOC (located in The Hotel at Oberlin Building) In anticipation of the Allen After Hours event with Tyler Gunther, j...
April 1, 2024 at 4:00 p.m.
Edie Carey (OC 2027) leads an informal discussion on Michael Boyd Roman’s The Smallest Giant Makes for an Easy Target. This...
April 22, 2024 at 4:00 p.m.
Hayden Asiano (OC 2026) leads an informal discussion on Artemio Rodriguez’s The Triumph of Death. This event is part of our...
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