LOVE POSITIVE WOMEN 2020 Valentine Making Workshops

For LOVE POSITIVE WOMEN 2020, Visual AIDS, the Fire Island Artist Residency, Dieu Donné, Positive Women's Network – USA, and the Well Project hosted four workshops to make handmade paper valentine cards. This year's workshops at Dieu Donné's papermaking studio produced 700 valentines cards to be mailed to women living with HIV around the world. Since 2015, the project has produced and distributed over 2,500 cards.

The 2020 workshops brought together Visual AIDS Artist Members, Fire Island Artist Residency alums, Dieu Donné Studio Residents, and members of the Women's Empowerment Art Therapy Group.

LOVE POSITIVE WOMEN is an ongoing project established by Visual AIDS Artist Member Jessica Whitbread in 2013 that uses Valentine’s Day as a backdrop to create a platform for individuals and communities to engage in public and private acts of love and caring for women living with HIV. Working from a place of strength, LPW models interconnectedness, relationship building, loving oneself, and loving ones' community.

LOVE POSITIVE WOMEN 2020 is funded in part by awards from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Elizabeth Taylor AIDS Foundation.

Photographs by Dina Raketa.