ARTIST INDEX

Visual AIDS Walkthrough




Guided Tour at Visual AIDS Archive
June 24, 2025



Special thanks to
Visual AIDS




In celebration of Pride Month, Civil Art toured the Visual AIDS archive, which houses the largest database of works by artists affected by HIV/AIDS. Our tour was led by Visual AIDS Archivist Jacs Rodriguez and Executive Director Kyle Croft, who highlighted how the archive’s past history motivates their current mission. Founded in 1988, Visual AIDS is the only contemporary arts organization fully committed to raising AIDS awareness and creating dialogue around HIV issues today. The Archive Project by Visual AIDS provides a database to inform and inspire contemporary art exhibitions, public programs, publications, and research by curators, art historians, activists, and students. By preserving the work of prominent artists that were affected by HIV/AIDS, the archive sustains artists’ legacies beyond their lifetime to inspire future generations. 


During Pride Month, Civil Art seeks to highlight the stories of marginalized voices nestled within the broader LGBTQIA+ community. The collaboration between Civil Art and Visual AIDS is especially important, as there has been a severe lack of documentation of API artists affected by AIDS/HIV. However, lack of documentation does not mean that their stories did not exist. The Visual AIDS Archive gave viewers a lens into the legacies of artistic visionaries by providing hands-on access to ephemera, including handwritten letters, postcards, and invitations, as well as research materials, artwork slides, and books. Our tour spotlighted prominent API and New York-based artists featured in the collection, including Martin Wong, Tseng Kwong Chi, and Felix Gonzalez-Torres.


Martin Wong was an Asian-American artist whose work celebrated his queer sexuality and represented the many ethnic identities in his art. He drew inspiration from the urban landscapes of San Francisco and New York, the cultural significance and personally foreign experience of Chinatown, and homoerotic imagery. Additionally, Wong was an important figure in the street culture of New York City’s Lower East Side, where he contributed immensely to the American graffiti art scene. Losing his life at the young age of 55 due to AIDS complications, Wong transformed the scope of queer representation in American art.  


Tseng Kwong Chi was a Hong Kong-born photographer whose work satirized tourist culture and the alienation of the Asian “other.” Chi is well known for his photographic series East Meets West, where he poses in front of iconic American attractions dressed in a Mao suit, wearing a pair of reflective sunglasses that obscure his gaze. By playfully critiquing themes of alienation and isolation, Chi resisted labels that painted him as an outsider. Tseng died at the age of 39 due to AIDS complications, leaving over 100,000 photographs that continue his legacy today.


Felix Gonzalez-Torres was a Cuban-born artist whose installations transformed the viewer from a passive observer to an active participant. His aesthetic revolves around minimalism and conceptual art, using everyday objects such as stacks of paper, puzzles, candy, strings of lights, and beads. Creating work that encouraged viewer participation, Torres invited physical engagement that challenged the state of contemporary art. Despite losing his life at the young age of 38 due to AIDS implications, Torres deconstructed hierarchies of art society and challenged the status quo.  


With more walkthroughs to come, Civil Art seeks to highlight the stories of art revolutionaries that were lost within the pages of history books until recently.



Video recorded and edited by 
Seon Hong Hur




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