A signature project of MAKE ART/STOP AIDS, Through Positive Eyes is an innovative and groundbreaking anti-stigma initiative. This participatory photography project is based on the belief that the arts have the power to inspire long-lasting positive changes in attitudes and behaviors related to HIV and AIDS—an assertion that is strongly supported by current social science and public health research.

Through Positive Eyes gives photographic voice to people living with HIV in major cities around the world. It is based on the belief that HIV-positive people should pick up their own cameras and make their own artistic statements. In doing so, they create powerful tools for combating stigma, which is one of the most formidable barriers to reducing the spread of AIDS today, arguably as significant as treatment access. Over the next two years HIV-positive people on five continents will take part in this unique initiative, creating powerful personal photo essays. From these images, local and international advocacy materials will be created, including exhibitions, short films, a book, and a website.

Through Positive Eyes was initially conceived and implemented in pilot form in Los Angeles in February 2007. Since then it has been produced in Mexico City (August 2008), Rio de Janeiro (June 2009), Johannesburg (March 2010), and Los Angeles (April 2011). Next, the project will travel to Kiev, before moving on to India and Washington, D.C.

The final outcome at the international level promises to reveal remarkable insights through threads of visual dialogue emerging among project participants in the different countries. A Brazilian women and a South African woman may address contrasting experiences of what it means to be pregnant mothers living with HIV, or a gay man in Mexico or Kiev and a ‘kothi’ in India could address experiences of sexuality-based stigma. The final presentation of images and texts will show how people in vastly different cultures, contexts, and circumstances respond when faced with the challenges of living with HIV. When taken together, these individual stories will transform into a noisy, fractious, but ultimately unifying global narrative. As we enter the fourth decade of the AIDS epidemic, these stories must be told.

Through Positive Eyes has been made possible in part by support from the Ford Foundation, University of California Institute for Mexico and the United States (UC Mexus), Brazil´s National STD and AIDS Programme, the U.S. President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), Open Society Initiative of South Africa (OSISA), the City of Los Angeles AIDS Coordinator’s Office, University of California – Los Angeles (UCLA) School of the Arts and Architecture, and the Herb Ritts Foundation.

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