- Medium
- 3 gelatin silver prints with plaques
- Dimensions
- Photographs: 12 3/8 x 18 5/8 in. (31.4 x 47.3 cm); 12 ¼ x 18 ½ in. (31.1 x 47 cm); and 18 5/8 x 12 3/8 in. (47.3 x 31.4 cm)
- Accession Number
- 2022.9A-F
- Credit
The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles
Gift of Patricia Navarro
Ray Navarro moved to New York City in 1988, where he quickly joined the group ACT UP (AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power). After going blind and deaf as a result of AIDS-related cryptococcal meningitis, Navarro enlisted his close friend artist Zoe Leonard to fabricate Equipped. Navarro paired stark black-and-white photographs of the mobility devices he used to navigate the hospital during his final months with sexually suggestive plaques that mimic the institutional signage of a hospital. The work’s peach-colored frames evoke the default generic skin tone of prosthetic devices. By refusing to depict the AIDS-affected body Navarro offered an alternative to sensationalized media
depictions of individuals dying from the disease.
Through this tongue-in-cheek display, Navarro positions sex positivity and queer humor as indispensable in the face of the epidemic. Equipped was last
presented in Los Angeles as a part of the Day of the Dead exhibition at the Los Angeles Photography Center in 1991.
