The UK AIDS Memorial Quilt is one chapter of the largest community art project in the world. In response to the AIDS pandemic, American activist Cleve Jones formed The NAMES Project in 1985. The project invited people to create textile panels to commemorate friends, family and loved ones lost during the pandemic. The individual panels are sewn together to create larger quilts. These larger quilts were often shown outdoors as a form of protest to raise awareness about HIV and AIDS. The displays often included a reading of all the names upon the panels. Activist groups across the globe organised their own local quilts.
In the late 1980s, Scottish activist Alistair Hulme visited San Francisco, where he witnessed an early display of The NAMES Project AIDS Memorial Quilt. Hulme later returned home to Edinburgh, where he set up The NAMES Project UK. One of the largest public displays of the quilt was the ‘Quilts of Love’ display in June 1994 at Hyde Park Corner, London, showing selected panels from the US and the UK, alongside sections created by fashion designers. The UK AIDS Memorial Quilt represents approximately 384 people affected by HIV and AIDS in the UK.
After the quilts had been in storage for a number of years, seven UK HIV support charities formed the UK AIDS Memorial Quilt Partnership in 2014 to conserve and display the quilt publicly as much as possible. The UK AIDS Memorial Quilt is an important reminder of those who sadly died before the introduction of antiretrovirals and that the HIV and AIDS pandemic is still ongoing. While antiretrovirals have made it possible to live with HIV, those who can access this medication still varies dramatically across the globe. HIV and AIDS continue to affect people and communities all over the world.
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