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.
XVII International AIDS Conference in Mexico City. Interview with Fatma Hacioglu from Turkey and David Jason Wessenaar from South Africa, two advocates for youth sexual and reproductive rights. They talk about sexuality education in their home countries.
XVII International AIDS Conference in Mexico City. Interview with the Canadian rapper Eternia who works with the 411 Initiative for Change. She tells about how she got involved in HIV/AIDS activism and the messages which she conveys through her music.
XIX International AIDS Conference in Washington D.C. Interview with the French Virologist, Françoise Barré-Sinoussi, winner of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2008 for discovering HIV as the cause of AIDS. Here she talks about the possibility of ending AIDS.
Dr Paul Volberding
In 1983, Paul Volberding, MD, developed the first AIDS ward in the world at the San Francisco General Hospital in San Francisco (Ward 86). Paul Volberding was instrumental in establishing the community-oriented San Francisco Model of AIDS Care, where patients were seen as individuals, not as victims. He was one of the first medical doctors to study the AIDS outbreak in San Francisco in the 80´s, and also one of the first to mix various existing medicines like a cocktail, before the start of ARV treatment breakthrough in 1996. In 1988, he became the first President of International AIDS Society, which he co-founded with Swedish professor and AIDS expert Lars Olof Kallings.
Film director Staffan Hildebrand visited Ward 86 in April 1988 for the documentary Crossover – The Global Impact of AIDS. He was also allowed to interview several of the dying patients. Since then, Paul Volberding has been interviewed several times for the FoA archive, most recent in 2011 when as a follow-up, he was asked to comment on the old footage from 1988, and compare today’s low HIV infection rate with the alarming situation in San Francisco back then.
In 1989, Paul Volberding assigned Staffan Hildebrand to produce a documentary for the VI International AIDS Conference in San Francisco, July 1990, where he was the Conference Co-Chair.
"At first, Paul had the somewhat ambitious idea, that I should produce a high class documentary for the San Francisco conference, in collaboration with the George Lucas Studio, which is situated outside San Francisco. Paul set up an appointment, and we drove in his car a wonderful morning the one hour drive to the Lucas Ranch. We met several of George Lucas’ key producers there. They were interested, but wanted a clear script and the time frame made it impossible for them to be part of it – the AIDS conference was to be held just five months after that meeting. All this felt a little like being in Hollywood. The Lucas project did not turn out to something concrete, but instead Paul connected me to the San Francisco local TV station KQED and together, we did the documentary for the AIDS conference. Maybe KQED was more up to my level than the Lucas Ranch Studio." (Staffan Hildebrand).
“Selma was a real personality, and a wonderful person, combing both professionalism with a commitment to gay rights and human rights. She did not give any interviews after she left the Health Department in the city in the early 90´s.” Staffan Hildebrand
Selma Dritz (1917 – 2008) was working as assistant director of the Health Departement’s Bureau of Communicable Disease Control in San Francisco when she became aware of a strange and virulent form of pneumonia and a rare form of cancer, Kaposi’s sarcoma, sweeping through the gay community of San Francisco.
Dritz played a key role in the in tracking the newly found disease and began to establish the etiology of what would be termed Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome, AIDS. Her no nonsense approach to her work in finding a way to stopping the disease and her involvement in the gay rights movement also made her one of the most important persons in the story AIDS activism.
In the movie And the band played on (1993) Selma Dritz was played by Lily Tomlin.
The Castro district is a neighborhood in Eureka Valley in San Francisco. It is now known to be one of the first gay neighborhoods in the United States but has a long history of different influences.
Castro Street was named after José Castro, a leader of the Mexican opposition to US rule in California in the 19th century. When the tram link from Eureka Valley to downtown was built the neighborhood became known as the Castro.
The Castro has always been populated by immigrants and sailors. At the end of the 19th century there was a big Finnish population, then Danes, Norwegians and Swedes followed. The Castro and surrounding areas was known as Little Scandinavia. With increasing immigration from other parts of the world the Castro gradually became an ethnically mixed working class neighborhood.
During World War II the US military discharged thousands of gay servicemen because of their sexuality, many settled in the Bay Area. When families started moving out from the Castro to the suburbs a large number of real estates were left and became popular among gay interests. In 1963 the Castro’s first gay bar was opened; the Missouri Mule.
The activist Martin Delaney was a co-founder of the advocacy group Project Inform. He was interviewed several times for the Face of AIDS Film Archive, from 1994 to 2006.
“Larry Kramer was the angry, aggressive AIDS activist who dared to confront anyone, even the White House, while Martin was a person behind the scenes who negotiated and used other tactics. But they were close allies and worked together with the goal to get more funding for AIDS research and better medication and to decrease stigma and discrimination surrounding HIV/AIDS." (Staffan Hildebrand).
Project Inform was a San Francisco based HIV activist organisation, founded in 1984 by Martin Delaney and Joe Brewer. It provided information about drugs and treatment for people living with HIV/AIDS. The stated mission was to assure the development of effective treatments and a cure for HIV, and support individuals to make informed choices about their health, and advocate for quality, affordable health care. The organization dissolved in 2019.
In 1998, the Face of AIDS Film Archive visited The Project Inform AIDS Hotline, where volunteers answered questions about HIV/AIDS and antiretroviral treatment.
Ronald D. Stall is a professor focusing his work on AIDS and behavioral research. Here he talks about the behavior changes within the homosexual community in the Castro District which had one of the highest HIV prevalences in North America in 1988.
David Perlman
David Perlman worked as a science journalist on the San Francisco Chronicle. In 1981, he was the first American journalist to report on AIDS. Perlman wanted a cover story, but the editor did not realize that his reporter had an international scoop at his hand, and put his story on page 8. In the interviews Perlman did for the Face of AIDS Film Archive, he gives a historical overview of the AIDS epidemic and talks about its medical, social and economic consequences.
In 1988, the Face of AIDS Film Archive visited a hotel for people who are living with HIV/AIDS in San Francisco. They interviewed Bart, who told them about the mission of the program and the services provided.
Dr Mervyn Silverman has been involved in the San Francisco and US AIDS response from the early years in the 80´s. He played an important role in uniting scientists, public health officials, opinion makers and celebrities in the emerging US AIDS movement.
In these interviews, Dr Mervyn Silverman talks about AIDS in San Francisco, New York and Africa. He explains the decrease of HIV/AIDS in San Francisco, as well as the increase in New York and in developing countries due to poverty or drugs problems.
The idea for The Names Project Memorial Quilt came to artist/HIV activist Cleve Jones and his colleagues in 1985 during the annual Candlelight March in San Francisco in memory of San Francisco Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk. The project officially started two years later, with the first showing on the National Mall in Washington, DC. The Quilt consists of panels paying tribute to individuals who have died of AIDS, there are now more than 50,000 individual memorial panels commemorating more than 105,000 individual lives.
In 1998, the Face of AIDS team visited the Quilt headquarter at that time outside San Francisco. There, they met Gert, working full time at the Quilt Office. In this clip, she is sewing several panels into a Quilt, so we can watch how the Quilt is growing.
The team also interviewed Scott Millar, who in 1998 was the Director of the Quilt Project.
“I really love and respect the Quilt Names Project, and I think it is one of the true wonders of the international AIDS movement”, film director Staffan Hildebrand says. “It combines creativity, with high visibility, media coverage and also a deep respect for those making the Quilts and for their loved ones and their close friends and relatives.”
The Face of AIDS team has visited the San Francisco General Hospital several times over the years, and met doctors, patients, nurses and researchers. One of them is Diane Johns, a nurse at San Francisco General Hospital. Here, she shares her thoughts on terminal care, patient participation, and home care. Diane started to work at San Francisco General Hospital in 1982 and started at the newly opened AIDS ward in 1983.
Nicole
Nicole did voluntary work in the Glide Memorial Church in San Francisco. In 1998, she was interviewed about love, safe sex and stigma.
Glide Memorial United Methodist Church opened in 1930, and is famous for its Gospel Choir and social service programs (HIV testing, women’s programs, drug recovery programs, etc).
