ROYAL ONTARIO MUSEUM INVITES YOU TO:
Stitching Grief
AIDS Memorial Quilt with Cleve Jones
October 30, 2024
7:00 PM – 8:00 PM, followed by a meet-and-greet reception from 8:00 PM – 9:30 PM
Join activist Cleve Jones, the AIDS Memorial Quilt’s visionary founder, and Ken Miller, Executive Director of the Canadian AIDS Society (CAS), for an intimate, candid conversation on the legacy of the AIDS Memorial Quilt and the CAS. Through stories, news, and life events, these two visionaries explore the relationship between textile arts, intimacy and care, and the politics surrounding craft and the AIDS epidemic. Moderated by journalist Valerie Pringle, the evening also includes a live music performance by Forte—Toronto Gay Men’s Chorus.
Program Information
Making its first public appearance in 1987 during the early years of the AIDS pandemic, the NAMES Project AIDS Memorial Quilt is a powerful, living memorial celebrating the lives of people who had died of AIDS-related causes. The inaugural quilt was comprised of 1,920 panels covering an area larger than a football field, and in 1996 had grown to include more than 40,000 panels, which stretched from the Washington Monument to the U.S. Capitol when displayed on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Today, the AIDS Memorial Quilt is accessible online and features 50,000 panels with nearly 110,000 names of those who died of AIDS-related causes sewn into it.
Completing the evening is a tour of the ROM original exhibition Quilts: Made in Canada, a meet-and-greet reception, and opportunities to purchase books on the topics discussed.
The night will also feature a meet-and-greet reception, and a tour of the Quilts: Made in Canada exhibition