It Was Vulgar and It Was Beautiful: How AIDS Activists Used Art to Fight a Pandemic
By Jack Lowery
Read by Vikas Adam
Unabridged
Format :
Retail CD (In Stock)
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1 Format: Retail CD
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$45.00
ISBN: 9781668609941
| Runtime: | 14.15 Hours |
| Category: | Nonfiction/History |
| Audience: | Adult |
| Language: | English |
Summary
Summary
A New York Times Book Review Editor’s Choice of the Week
In the late 1980s, the AIDS pandemic was annihilating queer people, intravenous drug users, and communities of color in America, and disinformation about the disease ran rampant. Out of the activist group ACT UP (AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power), an art collective that called itself Gran Fury formed to campaign against corporate greed, government inaction, stigma, and public indifference to the epidemic.
Writer Jack Lowery examines Gran Fury’s art and activism from iconic images like the “Kissing Doesn’t Kill” poster to the act of dropping piles of fake bills onto the trading floor of the New York Stock Exchange. Lowery offers a complex, moving portrait of a collective and its members, who built essential solidarities with each other and whose lives evidenced the profound trauma of enduring the AIDS crisis.
Editorial Reviews
Editorial Reviews
“Lowery painstakingly reconstructs conversations and negotiations that compel a reader to feel the era’s anguish and urgency.” —New York Times
“Educational and entertaining, this look at queer history has a lot to tell us about what’s going on today.” —BuzzFeed
“A fascinating study of how art galvanized AIDS activism in the 1980s and ’90s.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“Lowery lovingly portrays the strength, effort, happy victories, and overwhelming sadness of [ACT UP’s] historic efforts.” —Booklist (starred review)
“Lowery’s raw emotion strikes deep into the reader’s conscience. The context of how the art was incubated makes this narrative essential to the history of the AIDS epidemic.” —Library Journal (starred review)
I picked up Jack Lowery’s It Was Vulgar and It Was Beautiful and didn’t stop reading it for the next three days. Lowery’s plainspoken, patient, and probing approach to his dramatic subject matter is totally compelling, and his focus on Gran Fury fills in a critical piece of aesthetic and political history. Anyone and everyone interested in still-urgent questions about the relations between art, activism, living, and dying should immediately read this book. —Maggie Nelson, author of THE ARGONAUTS
Jack Lowery has written an engaging, provocative, and moving book about one of the most successful political movements in American history, a painstakingly researched narrative about how activism and art saved untold lives. At a time when the lessons of Gran Fury and ACT UP are more crucial than ever, this is essential reading. —Alex Halberstadt, author of YOUNG HEROES OF THE SOVIET UNION
A lively depiction of how graphic art can bring political activism to life. —Kirkus
Author
Author Bio: Jack Lowery
Jack Lowery is a writer and teacher whose writing has appeared in The Atlantic, the London Times Literary Supplement, and The Awl. He completed his MFA degree in nonfiction writing at Columbia University and has taught in the undergraduate writing program at Columbia University. As an editor, he has published the poetry of David Wojnarowicz.
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Details
Details
| Available Formats : | Retail CD |
| Category: | Nonfiction/History |
| Runtime: | 14.15 |
| Audience: | Adult |
| Language: | English |
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