Invest in Marble and Granite
Date | 1989 |
---|---|
Dimensions | Paper: 23 x 17 3/8 in. (58.4 x 44.1 cm) Overall: 23 x 17 3/8 in. (58.4 x 44.1 cm) |
Print medium | Print-Lithograph |
In 1989, a year after its first demonstration on Wall Street, ACT UP New York staged a protest that focused on local AIDS concerns. By then, nearly a decade after the start of the epidemic, AIDS had become the third leading cause of death in New York City. The mayor's office had put some measures in place to help treat people infected with HIV, but critics claimed these were too little and too late. ACT UP's "Target City Hall" demonstration was the first to address the city's mismanagement of the crisis. The poster's text conveys some of their concerns: the allocation of only half of one percent of the city's budget to AIDS, the long waiting time before drug users could enter treatment programs, the abundance of vacant apartments around the city while people with AIDS were living on the street, and the health department's reduction of infection estimates to cut costs. This poster is one of a number that ACT UP activists made to promote the protest. Their efforts were successful: on March 28, 1989, approximately 3,000 activists converged on City Hall to voice their concerns about the city government's response to the virus.
Purchase, with funds provided by the ICP Acquisitions Committee, 2000