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PARSONS SCHOOL OF DESIGN TO HOLD EXHIBITION:
"RECOVERING THE POSITIVE: ORIGINALS"
DECEMBER 1, 2001 – JANUARY 11, 2002

ORGANIZED IN CONJUNCTION WITH THE ESTATE PROJECT FOR ARTISTS
WITH AIDS: THE VIRTUAL COLLECTION

(New York, NY – November 5, 2001) Parsons School of Design, a division of New School University, is pleased to announce "Recovering the Positive: Originals," an exhibition organized in cooperation with the Estate Project for Artists with AIDS. The exhibition will open on December 1, 2001, World AIDS Day, and close on January 11, 2002. There will be an opening reception on Saturday, December 1 from 6-8pm. The exhibit will be held at the Arnold and Sheila Aronson Galleries (66 5th Avenue at 13th Street). Gallery hours are Monday - Saturday, 9am - 9pm. For further information call 212-229-8987.

Chris Packard, Ph.D., curates the exhibition. Professor Packard is a member of the Liberal Studies faculty at Parsons School of Design. Packard has contributed the essay to the catalog that accompanies the exhibit. Packard’s other works include Blind Trust: Guides for the Uninfected, a poetry and photographic collage in collaboration with visual artist Robert Flynt. Packard’s essays on literature and on teaching appear in Arizona Quarterly and Concerns, and his Sailor Mates and Cowboy Comrades: Male Erotic Friendship in Nineteenth-Century American Literature will be published by St. Martin’s Press in the fall of 2002.

All works included in "Recovering the Positive: Originals" are original works by artists represented in the Virtual Collection (www.artistswithaids.org), a website launched by the Estate Project in 1998. The collection contains approximately 3200 images of works created by visual artists who are living with or who have died of complications from HIV/AIDS. "Recovering the Positive: Originals" includes 25 individual paintings, prints, and photographs, three sculptures, two videos, and one performance piece. Twenty artists are represented.

The exhibition is being inaugurated in conjunction with World AIDS Day to focus attention on the far-reaching effects of the AIDS epidemic on the arts and culture in this country. June 2001 marked the twentieth anniversary of the first documented cases of AIDS in the United States. As the AIDS epidemic enters its third decade, and a new century, there is no cure in sight. Even if a cure were near at hand, there remains a great deal to be done in the documentation of work created by artists with AIDS. It is the mission of the Estate Project to advance this effort, the role of which remains as critical as it was at the projects founding in 1991.

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Parsons School of Design, a division of New School University, is one of the largest degree-granting colleges of art and design in the nation. Currently enrolled are about 2,400 undergraduate students, 380 graduate students, and 2,500 non-degree students from all 50 of the United States and from 60 countries. Parsons’ main campuses are located in New York City’s Greenwich Village and Midtown Manhattan. In addition, Parsons has affiliate schools in Paris, France; Kanazawa, Japan; Seoul, South Korea; and the Dominican Republic. Undergraduate degrees are offered in Architectural Design, Communication Design, Design and Management, Fashion Design, Fine Arts, Illustration, Integrated Design Curriculum, Interior Design, Photography, and Product Design. Graduate degrees are granted in Architecture, Design and Technology, Lighting Design, Painting, Sculpture, and the History of Decorative Arts. For further information on Parsons, call 212/229-8910 or go to the Web site at www.parsons.edu.

New School University, with 7,000 matriculated students and 25,000 continuing education students, is comprised of seven academic divisions: The New School, the Graduate Faculty of Political and Social Science, Parsons School of Design, Eugene Lang College, Mannes College of Music, the Robert J. Milano Graduate School of Management and Urban Policy, and the Actors Studio Drama School, as well as the University's B.F.A. in Jazz and Contemporary Music. New School Online University offers one of the largest selections of online courses in the nation. For further information about admission to New School University, call 877-528-3321 or go to the Web site at www.newschool.edu