September 29, 2014 – November 8, 2014

The National Library of Medicine’s traveling exhibition, Surviving and Thriving: AIDS, Politics, and Culture will be on display at the Library September 29 – November 8, 2014.

The exhibition explores the rise of AIDS in the early 1980’s and the evolving response to the epidemic over the last 30 years. The title Surviving and Thriving comes from a book written in 1987 by and for people with AIDS that insisted people could live with AIDS, not just die from it. Jennifer Brier, the exhibition curator, explains that “centering the experience of people with AIDS in the exhibition allows us to see how critical they were, and continue to be, in the political and medical fight against HIV/AIDS.” Surviving and Thriving presents their stories alongside those of others involved in the national AIDS crisis.

The six-banner traveling exhibition utilizes a variety of historic photographs as well as images of pamphlets and publications to illustrate how a group of people responded to, or failed to respond, to HIV/AIDS. This exhibition was produced by the National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health. Curated by Jennifer Brier, PhD, University of Illinois.