PAST EVENT

On World AIDS Day, we joined with the UK AIDS Memorial Quilt Partnership, Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop, and David McLean of Bona Varda for an intimate screening, panel, and procession of remembrance and reflection. The event also provided an opportunity to see a panel for the quilt itself.

The event was held in collaboration with, and inspired by, remarkable activist and Leith resident Ally van Tillo, founder of the UK AIDS Memorial Quilt and a key figure in Edinburgh’s early response to the AIDS epidemic in the late 1980s.

The night began with two film screenings. First, a recent interview with Ally van Tillo revisiting the origins of his activism and reflecting on how he brought the Quilt to the UK. Second, There Is A Light That Never Goes Out, 1995, a previously unseen documentary about the 1994 display of the UK AIDS Memorial Quilt in Hyde Park Corner, London.

We were then joined by a panel of local activists and researchers in discussion around Edinburgh’s queer history and the quilt’s legacy: Dom Miller-Graham of OurStory Scotland, Christopher Ward of Scotland’s leading HIV and Hepatitis C charity, Waverley Care; Bob Orr of Lavender Menace Queer Books Archive and Raymond Rose of its queer bookshop forerunner, West and Wilde; and chaired by Lecturer in Fine Art Critical Studies at Glasgow School of Art, Dr Cole Collins.

After the panel, we were serenaded by two songs performed by a community choir, led by Caspian Alexander-Reid of Edinburgh Trans Choir. We finished with a beautiful torchlight gathering at the Sculpture Workshop, a moment to come together and reflect on the film and panel discussion.

Thanks to the UK AIDS Memorial Quilt Partnership, a section of the Quilt, originally worked on by van Tillo, will be on display at Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop during the event. A panel of the Quilt will also remain on display at EAF’s French Institute office throughout the winter, bringing this irreplaceable piece of social history to the streets of Edinburgh.