NEW YORK - The Art Directors Club, the premier organization for creative people in integrated media and the first global collective of its kind, is honored to host the New York showing of Graphic Intervention: 25 Years of International AIDS Awareness Posters 1985-2010”, June 6 - July 29, 2011 at the ADC Gallery in New York.  For additional information, please visit www.adcglobal.org.

Graphic Intervention is drawn largely from the collection of Jim Lapides, founder of International Poster Gallery in Boston, and was organized by Massachusetts College of Art and Design (MassArt).  Lapides has spent the last decade amassing a collection of over 3,000 HIV/AIDS posters from more than 80 countries.  In addition to a large collection of HIV/AIDS posters, International Poster Gallery also offers thousands of original vintage posters from all periods and genres, many of which are available to browse on their website, www.InternationalPoster.com.

Graphic Intervention curators Elizabeth Resnick, professor and chair, Graphic Design at MassArt, and Javier Cortés, partner and creative director at Korn Design in Boston and New York, narrowed the exhibition to 153 examples from 44 countries, each poster carefully navigating socially complex themes presenting a myriad of visual solutions to a public health crisis.  

The exhibition at the ADC Gallery is made possible in part through support from Kenneth Cole, and draws from an extensive archive of arresting and fearless international public health announcements.  The show presents a comprehensive overview of the diverse visual strategies employed by government agencies, community activists, grassroots organizations, and motivated citizens to educate the local population.  

From countries ranging from Papua New Guinea to Denmark, the posters demonstrate the different approaches used for discussion of a socially complex subject.  The messages in Graphic Intervention (http://graphicintervention.org/) deftly champion pertinent sociopolitical issues—disease research and eradication, world health, international relations, sexual education, social prejudices and discrimination—in a remarkable way.  

“We’re thrilled to see this powerful exhibition touring the country,” comments Jim Lapides, owner of International Poster Gallery.  “In addition to their resonant public health messages, these posters are a way of remembering those who have died due to AIDS – a graphic quilt of a different kind.”

The opening week of the ADC exhibition coincides with the 2011 United Nations General Assembly High-Level Meeting on AIDS, June 8-10 in New York (www.unaids.org).  A special guest representative from the UN organization will be on hand for the June 6 opening at the ADC Gallery: Egyptian actor and activist Amr Waked, who has been named Regional Goodwill Ambassador for the Joint United Nations Program on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA).  

Graphic Intervention: 25 Years of International AIDS Awareness Posters 1985-2010 has previously shown at MassArt in Boston and Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, and will travel to York College of Pennsylvania, York PA and the Museum of Design Atlanta (MODA) later this year.  

ADC exhibition details:

¥ ADC Gallery

¥ 106 West 29th St., between 6th-7th Ave., New York

¥ June 6-July 29, 2011

¥ 10:00 am-6:00 pm, Monday through Friday

¥ Admission is free and open to the public.