Love Rules: The Harm Reduction Archives of Richard Berkowitz and Heather Edney

Visual AIDS presents an exhibition in MoMA PS1's Homeroom gallery that charts the early development and impact of harm reduction across the US in the late-twentieth century. Love Rules features materials from the archives of writers and activists Richard Berkowitz and Heather Edney—photography, DIY publications, and other ephemera—detailing the creation of safe sex guidelines and safer injection practices. Centering the expertise of sex workers and drug users, the presentation highlights how harm reduction strategies used by social services today are informed by the work of those most directly impacted by the AIDS epidemic and drug-related overdoses.

Organized by Blake Paskal, Programs Manager, Visual AIDS, and Sheldon Gooch, Curatorial Assistant, MoMA PS1 in collaboration with Greg Ellis, Archivist and Curator, Ward 5B Archives.

The exhibition builds on Visual AIDS’s ongoing engagement with harm reduction, including its 2020 collaboration with MoMA PS1 and What Would an HIV Doula Do?: Harm Reduction Is Not a Metaphor.