For New Orleans Magazine‘s March issue, portraits to accompany a Q&A session with playwright John Patrick Shanley, author of the amazing Doubt, a Parable.

As of today, Inviolata Mmbwavi is officially a candidate for Lurambi constituency for the March 4th elections in Kenya. As one of the country’s most outspoken women AIDS activists, she hopes to make history by winning the support of her rural home area after making her home in the capital for all of her adult life.

When she was first diagnosed with HIV at age 19, Mmbwavi felt ostracized and discriminated against at home; it took her moving to Nairobi to find her voice and join forces with other HIV activists to battle the stigma.

Besides her AIDS activism, however, she is  inspired to run for office to ensure that the progressive women and minority rights enshrined in Kenya’s new 2010 constitution will be upheld. Women are guaranteed 1/3 representation in parliament – and like her, many women’s rights activists are gearing up for the outcome of the election and how that quota will be dealt with.

I photographed Mmbwavi last October, when she was in New York to meet supporters.  Read Andy Kopsa’s article to find out more about her. You can find her facebook group (and fundraiser) here.

Hot off the presses, another biennial report for the Sargent Shriver Center on National Poverty Law that I was fortunate to work on with graphic designer Cliff Questel.  After some brainstorming and tossing around of ideas, it was decided that opting for very simple, full page studio portraits would be the best way to tell the story of how the Shriver Center addresses key issues as diverse as budget cuts, child care, the foreclosure crisis and prisoner re-entry programs.

Meet Robert, Liliana, Elise and Mitzi:

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It’s been a busy summer! This weekend marked the final days of the Governors Island Art Fair installation of A Graying Pandemic,
a spin-off of the ongoing Graying of AIDS project.

For our participatory installation in the Global Village of the XIX International AIDS Conference – held in Washington, DC, from July 22-27, 2012 – the Graying of AIDS team (Naomi Schegloff, Viviana Peretti and myself) worked with adults age 50+ who are living with HIV/AIDS to create a series of photographic portraits and interviews, exploring what it means to be aging with the virus around the globe. View the rest of this entry »

Thinking of the wonderful Bob Franke, who passed away over the holidays at the age of 78. I feel very grateful to have had the opportunity to interview this truly memorable and inspiring man about his fight against HIV discrimination in long term care.

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SPLC is launching a campaign to draw attention to the damage done – mostly to young people – by so-called pray the gay away “therapy” approaches that are supported by various religious denominations in this country.  As part of this media effort, I produced a series of portraits of Chaim Levin, an orthodox Jewish young man who has been an outspoken opponent of “reparative therapy” and sexual abuse in his religious enclave of Brooklyn.

Here’s a video (produced separately by TruthWinsOut.org) of Chaim and another young man recounting their experiences with Jonah, a – highly UN-orthodox – approach to attempting to cure Jewish youth of their same-sex attractions. View the rest of this entry »

Women’s Soccer World Cup begins in Germany. Can’t honestly say I am rooting for the home team…

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Graying of AIDS: Older Americans at risk for HIV infection.
Anna Fowlkes, 64, didn’t date for years after her husband, Sonny, died of a brain tumor. And after she finally did, she learned she’d become infected with HIV. View the rest of this entry »

Portrait series of workers and management in a newer, greener plant for the North American car market – bye-bye, Mexican Beetle…  Produced for Volkswagen’s German customer magazine, with additional video content for their iPad version.

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Ed Shaw: Educating Older Adults About HIV/AIDS

Disease is no stranger to the 50-plus crowd, by: Susan Kreimer | from: AARP Bulletin | January 25, 2011

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