Cultural Sponge was ask to conceptualize and design an ad campaign for Phoenix Aids Walk 2009. This was the second Phoenix AIDS WALK since it was disbanded in 2004. It wasn’t until 2008 that AUNT RITA’s Foundation resuscitated the walk and now in it’s second season since the 2008 walk we are once again seeing the faces and the feet that will be walking for all those struggling with this virus.
When developing an ad campaign, Heather Brown, owner of Cultural Sponge decided to go with the reality of this disease, the people in our community living with it. “Why are we walking?” was a question that came to her mind. We do it for those that we know and love, hoping that we can make a difference. If the journey of a thousand miles begins with one step, then as we all take that initial step year after year we grow closer and closer towards the destination. She decided she was going to be taking her first steps with her ad campaign, she took real people from the community both living with the disease, but also those affected by the disease. “I had never (really) met someone who had been infected, and doing this campaign was the first time I really sat down and met people living with this (virus).
I wanted to show the real faces of people in our community living and functioning, and to share their personal stories.”
In her ads for Phoenix Aids Walk Heather used not only people living with HIV, but also the partners of people who have HIV. Each ad was carefully crafted to appeal to all members of the Phoenix community. “HIV doesn’t just affect the gay community. I was shocked to find a family with both the mother and the adopted son living with HIV. When we were doing the photo shoot I knew that their adopted son had HIV that he had contracted from birth, and I knew that one other person in the family was also infected, but I didn’t know who. After the shoot the Mother of the family came up and asked me if I knew who the other person was. She then told me it was her, she had contracted the virus from her previous husband.” Barb is now remarried and with an adopted son related to her by blood, carrying the same virus, she lives a normal life regardless of what people think. She is raising two children with a husband that loves her for who she is, not what she isn’t.
An ad featuring Tyler, who recently worked with BE-A-HERO on their July HIV/AIDS educational panel, shared his story and a tattoo on his wrist that says HIV Positive Pedalers. The Positive Pedalers is a group of people living with HIV/AIDS committed to building a supportive and inclusive community for others and themselves through participation in bicycle-related activities. The group comprises nearly 600 men and women with HIV/AIDS from across the United States, including California, Minnesota, Texas, Arizona, Ohio, and New York. Both him and his partner are walking to end the stigmas that only two positive people can have a functioning, loving, committed relationship. HIV is a part of their relationship, but it doesn’t define the relationship.
In another ad we see, Barbara, a HIV negative heterosexual woman holding a picture of her brother who was positive, but passed away back in 1988. His status didn’t just change his life. Her life will also be changed forever, “As an RN I wanted to help dispel the fear and anxiety many people feel regarding HIV… We’re in this together – young and old, gay and straight. I walk for all of us.” She is the only ad that doesn’t show her staring into the camera; instead the focus of her attention is on her brother’s picture. The picture had a haunting quality to it, the photographer, Cyndie Schmidt of Cynsational Images, graced us with a moment in time that most people don’t see as the face of AIDS. Many loved ones are left after people pass away and need those that remember them to walk. Her story is reason enough to start the journey on the Phoenix Aids Walk.
Heather commented on her view of the ads, “I don’t see people with HIV all I see is their eyes.” We have this wall we put up the minute we find out that someone is positive, we are either cautious and we don’t want to think of them in a different light, or we become fearful of the instant reminder of our mortality.
The Phoenix Aids Walk ad campaign consisted of print ads that were published in the Phoenix metro area. Click here to see the entire campaign.