The NAMES Project AIDS Memorial Quilt, often abbreviated to AIDS Memorial Quilt or AIDS Quilt, is a memorial to celebrate the lives of people who have died of AIDS-related causes. Weighing an estimated 54 tons, it is the largest piece of community folk art in the world, as of 2020. Conceived in 1985, during the early years of the AIDS pandemic, when social stigma prevented many AIDS victims from receiving funerals, it has been displayed several times on the Mall in Washington, D.C.. In 2020, it returned to San Francisco, where it is cared for by the National AIDS Memorial. The quilt has an approximate area of 1,300,000 ft2 (120,000 m2) and can be seen virtually.
History and structure The idea for the NAMES Project Memorial Quilt was conceived on November 27, 1985, by AIDS activist Cleve Jones during the annual candlelight march, in remembrance of the 1978 assassinations of San Francisco Supervisor Harvey Milk and Mayor George Moscone. For the march, Jones had people write the names of loved ones that were lost to AIDS-related causes on signs, and then they taped the signs to the old San Francisco Federal Building. All the signs taped to the building looked like an enormous patchwork quilt to Jones, and he was inspired. The NAMES Project officially started in 1987 in San Francisco by Jones, Mike Smith, and volunteers Joseph Durant, Jack Caster, Gert McMullin, Ron Cordova, Larkin Mayo, Steve Kirchner, and Gary Yuschalk. At that time many people who died of AIDS-related causes did not receive funerals, due to both the social stigma of AIDS felt by surviving family members and the outright refusal by many funeral homes and cemeteries to handle the deceased's remains. Lacking a memorial service or grave site, the Quilt was often the only opportunity survivors had to remember and celebrate their loved ones' lives. Volunteers created hundreds and later thousands of panels in a storefront on Market Street. The Quilt is a memorial to and celebration of the lives of people lost to the AIDS pandemic which marks it as a prominent forerunner of the twentieth century shift in memorial design that moved towards celebrating victims or survivors. Each panel measures three by six feet (90 by 180 centimeters), approximately the size of the average grave; this connects the ideas of AIDS and death more closely.
Inaugural Quilt display The Quilt made its first public appearance on October 11, 1987, during the Second National March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights on the National Mall. Comprising 1,920 panels and covering an area larger than a football field, 48 volunteers ceremonially unfolded the Quilt at sunrise. Participants read aloud the names represented in the Quilt, establishing a tradition followed at subsequent displays. The event drew half a million visitors that weekend.
Quilt tours and exhibits The inaugural national tour of The Quilt took place in spring and summer 1988, raising nearly half a million dollars. Assisted by over 9,000 volunteers, a seven-person crew traveled, displayed, and expanded The Quilt. Local panels added in each city tripled its size from 1,920 to over 6,000 panels by the tour's conclusion. The 1989 Quilt North America Tour visited 19 U.S. cities, including 7 in Canada, coinciding with local LGBT events in June and July, laying the groundwork for the Canadian AIDS Memorial Quilt. By October, the Quilt featured over 12,000 panels and was once again exhibited on The Ellipse in Washington, D.C. In October 1992, the entire Quilt, featuring panels from every state and 28 countries, was displayed on Washington's National Mall. The quilt, more than 10 times its original size, with over 21,000 handmade panels, stretched from the base of the Washington Monument to the Lincoln Memorial in President's Park. During President Clinton's inaugural parade on January 20, 1993, the NAMES Project participated with over 200 volunteers marching down Pennsylvania Avenue, carrying 90 Quilt panels. Spanning the National Mall from the Washington Monument to the U.S. Capitol in Washington, The Quilt attracted nearly 1.2 million visitors in October 1996. Over the three-day event, more than 40,000 panels were displayed. Notably, President Bill Clinton and First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton attended, marking the last full exhibition of the Quilt on the Mall; by this point in time, the HIV/AIDS epidemic was finally seeing a major decline. In June 2004, The Quilt featured over 8,000 new panels created since the 1996 exhibit. The display took place on The Ellipse in Washington, in observance of National HIV Testing Day. For the AIDS Memorial Quilt's 25th anniversary in July 2012, comprising over 48,000 panels honoring 94,000 lives lost to AIDS, it returned to the National Mall and 50 sites around D.C. during the XIX International AIDS Conference. Due to its size, organizers rotated 1,500 panels daily at the Smithsonian Folklife Festival. This event marked the quilt's last full exhibition since 1996. As of 2020, the AIDS Memorial Quilt is available online, featuring 50,000 panels with nearly 110,000 names sewn into them. The collection is searchable by block number or name, allowing users to read the stories stitched into each panel. A guide is provided for navigating the collection if required. In June 2022, the National AIDS Memorial commemorated the 35th anniversary of the AIDS Memorial Quilt with a significant outdoor display in Golden Gate Park's Robin Williams Meadow. The exhibition showcased 3,000 panels, offering a poignant tribute to lives affected by AIDS. In 2024, panels from the AIDS Memorial Quilt were displayed at the White House for the first time; this was an event led by President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden.
Relocation In 1997, the NAMES Project headquarters moved from San Francisco to Washington, D.C., and in 2001 the quilt panels were moved from San Francisco to Atlanta, Georgia. The NAMES Project Foundation was headquartered in Atlanta. In 2019, the organization announced that the Quilt would be relocating to San Francisco under the permanent care and stewardship of the National AIDS Memorial. In 2020, its archives were relocated to the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress. The AIDS Memorial Quilt is warehoused in San Francisco when not being displayed, and continues to grow, consisting of more than 50,000 individual memorial panels (to over 110,000 people) and weighing an estimated 54 tons as of 2022.
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