More to me than HIV

Glenn Stevens from the HIV project has announced Londonbased photographer Angus Stewart is now on board to take shots of those participating in the photo exhibition at Jubilee Library and a selection of branch libraries

Angus Stewart primarily works with diverse communities such as circus and burlesque performers, GDI Hub (Global Disability Hub) and Rights to the City, a programme with grassroots activists in London and Salvador. Most recently he was commissioned by Lambeth Council on a portrait project showing leadership in the borough – starting with Kwame Kwei-Armah at the Young Vic, and Florence Eshalomi MP, however, as the pandemic hit and claimed 140,000 lives, he began to see the project from a very different angle and so photographed

teams of people working on the frontline during this pandemic, including domestic abuse charities, health care workers, spiritual and humanist leaders. More info: www.angusstewart.me/leadership.

For Angus, HIV awareness is very important to him, having grown up through the 1980s HIV/ AIDS pandemic and witnessed the devastation it had on the LGBTQ+ community.

“From the very beginning of that pandemic, gay men were attacked by the press; it was a really terrifying thing and I think like many gay men of my age I developed a very damaged identity because of the systematic and government sanctioned homophobia that was metered out by the press.

HIV has always felt quite personal in that sense, it feeds into a lot of the photography work I do with marginalised communities, I want to find the core within each community, to explore with each person I work with their inner strength and the beauty within that community and show that to the wider public.”

Angus really understands the power an image can portray and we are very excited to have his professional expertises for the More to Me Than HIV project. We are very keen to reach out to those living with HIV from the ethnic, transgender and drug use communities.

When we asked Angus about the importance of getting a diverse representation for these kind of projects, he said: “If we can get people from marginalised communities to take part in the project then it will go a long way in connecting with others who may not feel they have been represented before. Collectively, participants in the project can really make a real difference in helping to break down stigma and challenge the misconception that HIV only effects gay men, and as long as this myth is still allowed to be perpetrated we run the risk spreading the virus among people who do not know they can get it.”

Angus will be taking the project’s photographs through one-hour booked sessions at Jubilee Library, Brighton, at the end of September. If you would like to be part of the exhibition and help stamp out HIV stigma then please get in touch via the project’s webpage: www.moretomethanhiv.life