It has now been forty years since the CDC bulletin Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR) described cases of a rare lung infection in five gay men in Los Angeles. This was the first official report of what would become known as AIDS – Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome. What reactions did the first reports of a strange, new disease generate – amongst medical researchers and doctors, in the gay community, and in the public at large? What can we learn from the past to meet the challenges of the future? In this theme, we have collected film clips from the archive, documentaries and essays on the HIV and AIDS pandemic.

To acknowledge the World AIDS Day this year the Face of AIDS Film Archive choses to dive into the archive and focus on the history of AIDS and HIV in Sweden: the first diagnosed case, the activists, the politicians, the health care and the public. We have put together a short film on this theme with clips from the archive – a short film on a constantly current topic from our vast collection of material.

The 23rd International AIDS Conference was set to be held in San Francisco and Oakland in 6-10 July 2020. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the conference will be virtual this year. With this theme, the Face of AIDS Archive pays tribute to the conference, the cities of San Francisco and Oakland, and the achievements made in the HIV response. Watch documentaries and interviews from the 1980s to the present, hear the voices of activists, patients, researchers and hospital staff.

The theme Women and AIDS puts the light on the many stories we have in the Face of AIDS Archive told by women, aspects on hiv and AIDS often not getting enough attention. Apart from films from the archive the theme also includes texts written by writers Emma Gray Munthe, Erik Gunnarsson and Izabella Rosengren and also unique illustrations by Hanna Gustavsson. The theme is a collaboration with Stockholms Kvinnohistoriska.