This book, Reframing Bodies: AIDS, Bearing Witness, and the Queer Moving Image, by Roger Hallas, recounts the ways in which queer films can “bear witness” to the AIDS epidemic and its social, psychological, and political effects on the LGBTQ+ community. His book includes examples of different types of queer media, including various examples of film, portraits, and relational art, in an attempt to convey the most honest depiction of HIV/AIDS possible. In an example of relational art, Hallas discusses Felix Gonzalez-Torres’s “AIDS-themed installation art,” Untitled, (Portrait of Ross in LA) (1991), which invites viewers to take a piece of candy with them, actively involving them in the representation of his partner’s life with AIDS. Hallas explains that gallery visitors are encouraged “to partake in their literal consumption, an act of both dismemberment and communion that blurs the distinction between the body of the artwork and its beholder” (230).
#lgbtqexperiencesusa #queerfilm #AIDSepidemic #bearingwitness #felixgonzaleztorres
(photo of cover taken by me of a book from RR Library. Work Cited: Hallas, Roger. Reframing Bodies: AIDS, Bearing Witness, and the Queer Moving Image. Duke University Press, 2009.)
-MF