Time To Deliver: Community
Action on AIDS is a public engagement event that brings the urgency
of AIDS home. A field of 8,000 flags, arranged in the shape of
a red AIDS ribbon surrounded by white confronts visitors
with the dramatic and tragic scale of AIDS.
Why 8,000?
This is
one flag for every person who will die from AIDS, every day.
This moving tribute is a powerful
way to connect communities in the fight against AIDS and to mobilize
support for initiatives that address AIDS and poverty.
“Time to Deliver ” is a large scale public art installation that makes an unforgettable statement about the crisis of AIDS and passionately encourages viewers to get informed, get involved, take action, donate, and volunteer to stop the pandemic. It provides an opportunity for community based organizations to become involved in an international public education campaign through public art, linking these grassroots community organizations together into a network of like-minded and determined groups who can share skills and resources-community to community across the planet.
An innovative public engagement project entitled: Cross Canada –: Community Action for Aids, a partnership initiative between VIDEA, SOLID (Saltspring Organisation for Life Improvement and Development) and ICAD (Inter-Agency Coalition on AIDS and Development), involves eight communities from Whitehorse to St. Johns in a combination of partnership building, public engagement, community and educational outreach with a unique public art installation in solidarity with the 2006 International AIDS Conference in Toronto. On Sunday, August 13, the flags were fluttering in the wind in Roundhouse Park, across from the conference venue in Toronto, where the 20,000 plus delegates dedicated to fighting AIDS are gathered from all over the world.
Installed in 9 communities across Canada, "Time
to Deliver" has proven to be a powerful focal point to bring
awareness and spur action on the issues surrounding AIDS. SOLID
is calling on community groups worldwide to make their own “A
Day of AIDS” installations. Organizations with a focus on
global issues, AIDS, health, poverty and gender equality are invited
to participate in this campaign to mobilize communities, awaken
the public, and step up pressure on world leaders to deliver on
their promises to scale up treatment and prevention of HIV and
AIDS.
In the spirit of engaging
people to ACT meaningfully, the flag project takes on a life of
its own once the flags are taken down. Artists, teachers, quilters,
grandparents... anyone who has a hand with a needle and thread
was invited to transform flags into squares of quilts. The quilts were sent to Lesotho, Southern Africa,
in November to act as warm blankets for orphans who live in the
mountains.
Press Release: http://www.videa.ca/index.php?pageid=95
View the history of SOLID's
flag installation on Omidyar Network: http://www.omidyar.net/group/solid/news/1/?searchterm=solid%20crosses
Click here to see an archive
of past SOLID installations
