This year I have nothing profound to say about World AIDS Day, other than that it’s profoundly sad that we continue to need to have a World AIDS Day.

I was, nevertheless, going to have a wack at it, because, well, it seemed like the thing to do. But because everything is connected to everything else, I immediately got distracted, although you’ll have to admit that this isn’t actually a tangent at all. One of the first links that popped up when I surfing about trying to decide what to post was Vanderbilt University’s calender of events. A lovely school, but several states away so it didn’t seem relevant. I clicked on it anyway. Halfway down the page this exhibit announcement caught my eye:

Instruments of Healing, Glass Art by Tim Tate All Day
Open to the Public
Vanderbilt University Hospital Mezzanine Gallery
Tim Tate, nationally known artist has a small and stunning display of glass art in the Vanderbilt University Hospital. Tate uses images of hearts, hands and figures in his fused glass sculptures to create personal and symbolic narratives of healing and hope. In the 1980’s Tate was diagnosed with HIV and it was then he made the conscious decision to use his craft as to give voice to his emotions regarding his illness. Some works of healing imagery are embedded and fused in colored glass of opaque tones and encased in steel. Others works are stand alone icons of hearts with fire shooting out of the top from his Flaming Hearts Series. Tim Tate is the founder and director of the Washington Glass School, which is located in the Washington D. C. His glass sculptures can be found in are in the collections of the Smithsonian’s Renwick Gallery, The National Institutes of Health, and Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Recently Tate was included in the book, 50 Distinguished Contemporary Artists in Glass. Tim Tate’s art will be on display in the mezzanine gallery in the main lobby of the Vanderbilt University Medical Center Hospital and free to the public. The show will be exhibited until December 31, 2006. For more information, please call the office of Cultural Enrichment at 615-936-1234.

They don’t have any pictures of the show posted. Here are some images of Tim’s work from his Washington Glass School Website. Three dimensional glass sculptures lose much in the image-capturing process (although these are very nice images), but I hope that the pictures and that little bio up there encourage you to check out Tim’s work or catch one of his talks.

I’m a bit (a lot) biased, I must admit, since we are friends and Husband and I also have two of Tim’s reliquary pieces in our collection. But even if I’d never set foot in a room with him, I’d find his statements on art and healing and his imagery and motifs every bit as compelling.

Really.

I swear!

I noticed that google started out the day linking the Red campaign as the World AIDS day link on the main page, but this afternoon the link changed to a general google search for the phrase world AIDS day.” I wonder if that was planned, or if there was some discussion behind it. It’s also possible that rather than an anti-consumerist backlash, it was changed because the Project Red website couldn’t handle the traffic. I could surf around and try to find out, but aimless conjecture is an acceptable form of “journalism” in the blogosphere, so there you have it.

I honestly haven’t read much about the Red campaign (beyond the PR and the hype). It seems solid and focused. Perhaps they can avoid the diffussion and compassion fatigue that the proliferation of pink products that allege to support breast cancer seems to be causing. Nothing wrong with products for a cause, but without oversight, how can you know if your money is well spent, or if you should have just given the money right to a charity. It’s consumerism for a cause, but if it’s all endorsed by the cause, it’s (hopefully) honest and accountable. The Global Fund, which the Red campaign supports appears to be a pretty amazing thing, so at least on the surface it all seems quite brilliant.

It strikes me, in retrospect, as beyond silly to bother to link to the google home page. As if I think you have no other way to ever find your way to google. Why do that? I can’t tell you, beyond “it seemed like a good idea at the time.”