Note to Correspondents

‘Access to Life’ Exhibit Opens at United Nations Headquarters

 

The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria and Magnum Photos will open an exhibition to the public on Tuesday, 5 October, entitled “Access to Life”.  Through photography, multimedia pieces and text, the project chronicles the transformative effect that access to free antiretroviral drug treatments is having on AIDS patients around the world.

Working in partnership with the agency Magnum Photos to create “Access to Life”, The Global Fund sent an international team of eight photographers to nine countries in November 2007, and for a second visit four months later.  Their aim was to document the dramatic impact of treatment on more than 30 individuals and their families.  While not shying away from portraits of those for whom treatment came too late or was not successful, the “Access to Life” exhibit shows how access to free antiretroviral drug treatment is having a transformative effect around the world, not only for the individuals portrayed, but on the lives of millions of AIDS patients accessing treatment through programmes supported by The Global Fund, the United States President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), and other partners.

The United Nations in New York will be the eighth international exhibition venue since the first “Access to Life” exhibit opened in June 2008, at the Corcoran Museum in Washington, D.C.  The exhibit has also been shown in Berlin, Madrid, Oakland ( California, United States), Oslo, Rome and Tokyo, with the companion book launched in Paris on World AIDS Day, 2008.

The “Access to Life” project features the work of the following Magnum photographers:  Jonas Bendiksen (Norway), Jim Goldberg (United States), Alex Majoli (Italy), Steve McCurry (United States), Paolo Pellegrin (Italy), Gilles Peress (France), Eli Reed (USA) and Larry Towell (Canada).

This exhibition is presented at the United Nations through the support of the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) and the United Nations Department of Public Information.

For more information about the Access to Life project and for rights free press photos, please visit:  accesstolife.theglobalfund.org.

For more information on United Nations exhibitions, call Jan Arnesen, tel.:  +1 212 963 8531; or Liza Wichmann, tel.:  +1 212 963 0089.

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For information media • not an official record