Arts & Entertainment
Unfurling the Quilt
D.C. residents have multiple opportunities to see AIDS memorial in coming weeks
The AIDS Quilt during a previous display in Washington. (Blade file photo)
The 1 million annual visitors to the Smithsonian Folklife Festival have rarely expected to engage in an international discourse about AIDS at the event in the past. This year, however, attendees can tell their own stories regarding HIV/AIDS through a variety of creative outlets and add to the already massive AIDS Memorial Quilt that will blanket part of the National Mall.
For the first time in the festival’s history, the Smithsonian Center of Folklife and Cultural Heritage is collaborating with the NAMES Project Foundation with the program “Creativity and Crisis: Unfolding the AIDS Memorial Quilt.”
The NAMES Project Foundation, established in 1987, is the Atlanta-based international organization that houses and maintains the AIDS Memorial Quilt. About 8,000 of the quilt’s 48,000 panels will be featured at the Folklife Festival to commemorate the quilt’s 25th anniversary and educate visitors about how art has been utilized to address an international epidemic.
“It’s a lovely collaborative effort between the Smithsonian Center of Folklife and Cultural Heritage, who are the presenters along with us,” Julie Rhoad, executive director of the NAMES Project, says. “It’s been a delight working with the curatorial team at the Smithsonian.”
The festival starts Wednesday and will continue through July 1, and will be held again from July 4-8 on the National Mall between 7th and 14th streets. Admission to all events is free. Festival hours are from 11 a.m.-5:30 p.m. each day and special events such as concerts and dance parties begin at 6 p.m.
“Creativity and Crisis: Unfolding the AIDS Memorial Quilt” will include a multitude of craft demonstrations, dance and musical performances, theater, children’s activity areas and interactive discussions that will complement the presence of the quilt at the festival. Many of the featured performances will be by artists who have been affected by HIV and AIDS. Visitors will have the opportunity to help make panels that will be incorporated into the quilt, and to tell their own stories.
“We receive a new panel on the average every day, every year. Right now we have I think several hundred that are already in our possession that during the Folklife Festival we will have Gert, who’s been with us 25 years, bundle and sew them on the National Mall,” Rhoad says. “There’s a whole host of creativity and expression around HIV and AIDS and the domestic and global efforts in expression, all centered and viewed through the lens of what the quilt has done.”
In the event of a rain, the NAMES Project has an expertly organized plan called the “rain fold” to protect the quilt.
“Each time we’ve been in D.C. we’ve had to deploy the plan. Amazingly, what happens is we have plastic and we have a way it gets folded up, then we take it under tents,” Rhoad says. “It’s an amazing thing to see. It’s what happens when you’re in the presence of the quilt.”
In addition to their display at the Folklife Festival, many of the quilt’s 48,000 panels will be on the National Mall again from July 21-25 during the start of the International AIDS Conference. About 40 locations throughout the Washington metropolitan area will also display portions of the quilt through July 27. Visit quilt2012.org for more details on when and where the quilt will be displayed in the area.
“It’s important to work as hard as we can to get to D.C. and to make this display a reality. It certainly gets people talking. It certainly calls on society to really think about our humanity and to really think about our connection to one another,” Rhoad says. “What a gift to be on the Smithsonian stage.”
The NAMES Project staff deeply appreciates support from festival visitors for their cause.
“Support comes in many ways — time, talent, treasure. Each is valued by us,” Rhoad says. “It takes a great deal of support to move the quilt to D.C. It takes even more to get it ready for its next adventure.”
The Smithsonian and NAMES Project have collaborated with one another exceptionally well, revealing the power of cooperation in addressing a vital cause.
“The quilt is the ultimate in folk art. It is done by everybody. These are not professional quilters for the most part,” Arlene Reiniger, the Smithsonian’s curator for “Creativity and Crisis: Unfolding the AIDS Memorial Quilt,” says. “It’s been wonderful working with the NAMES Project Foundation. They are the ones with the knowledge behind the quilt, the knowledge and resources. What we do is work with them to translate all of this information into a festival program.”
For more information on “Creativity and Crisis: Unfolding the AIDS Memorial Quilt,” visit festival.si.edu.
The 2026 World Pride March was held on Saturday, Aug. 8 in Amsterdam. Tens of thousands of participants marched from Martin Luther Kingpark to the grounds of the Pride Village at Museumplein.
(Washington Blade photos by Michael Key)
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The weekly drag show “Daddy Issues” was held at Kiki on Wednesday, Aug. 5. Performers included Evry Pleasure, Indiana Bones and Tiara Missou-Sidora.
(Washington Blade photos by Landon Shackelford)
Books
Something’s off about Dad. When is it time to step in?
‘When Memory Fades’ can help when families face dementia
‘When Memory Fades’
By Nathaniel Chin, MD
c.2026, St. Martin’s Essentials
$30/422 pages
Mom called you in a panic the other day.
She’d lost her keys and by the time you arrived to help, she’d found them. In the refrigerator.
These kinds of things keep happening, not often but often enough, and you don’t know quite what to worry about. But in the new book “When Memory Fades” by Nathaniel Chin, MD, you’ll learn about the journey ahead, for both of you.
You can’t remember why you walked into a room. You got lost last week, going to the bank. Popular wisdom says that things like that are normal as we age, but Chin says that’s not true – although the answer may not be a worst-case scenario, either. Yes, memory problems could just be signs of stress, dehydration, or lack of sleep – or is it time to see a doctor?
Chin says maybe, yes.
He was working his way through medical residency when his father, a geriatrician in Madison, Wisc., was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. Chin, now a geriatrician, was blindsided, but that diagnosis also changed his life.
Here, he writes about the brain, and how Alzheimer’s and dementia are diagnosed, explaining that dementia has many faces and, depending on a doctor’s evaluation, memory problems might be slowed or improved. He shares his father’s illness with readers, but he also writes about his mother, a steadfast, steady caretaker.
Her story reminds reader-guardians to care for themselves, too.
Know how to talk the talk, so that you can have “a more productive” conversation with your doctor. Understand that there’s nothing “normal” about dementia or Alzheimer’s. Know the statistics – African Americans are affected with dementia twice as much as whites – and know how to lower your risks. Learn here what questions to ask, how to break the news to everyone, and any legal matters that will be important soon. And know how to tend to you.
Says Chin, “The best action you can take is to educate yourself… The more you understand, the better equipped you are to make sound judgments.”
Something’s off about Dad, just a lot of little things that don’t add up. When is it time to step in? “When Memory Fades” can help you decide.
Wise, wide-spread, comprehensive, and compassionately helpful, this is a book you can read and then take it to the doctor with your loved one. It’s a book that makes sense when nothing else does, and its biggest feature is that it smoothly transitions from easy-to-grasp science and charts, to gentle coaching for caregivers. Author Nathaniel Chin, MD writes with storytelling, humility, grace, and experience from both sides of the Alzheimer’s/dementia issue, and his words are reassuring but also urgent. Learn, but don’t wait, he says. Know how to safeguard yourself. See your doctor, and don’t fear testing. Watch for signs of depression. And never, ever stop asking for help.
Read those last seven words, and find “When Memory Fades” now. It’s a book to have on your shelf, whether you’re 45 or 95 because, as you’ll see, dementia happens and knowledge is key.
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