The Goethe-Institut Washington And Whitman Walker Health Present: Rosa Von Praunheim's THE AIDS TRILOGY

This July and August, the Goethe-Institut Washington and its local partners in the Queer as German Folk: Celebrating 50 Years of Transatlantic Rainbow Friendship project invite you to three very special screenings of German filmmaker Rosa von Praunheim's The AIDS Trilogy. Each of these three compelling documentaries explores a different facet of the AIDS crisis in New York City and Berlin. From the bold artwork of Keith Haring and David Wojnarowicz, to the demonstrations of ACT UP and TAG, to the unusual backlash from Berlin's gay scene against pushes for safer sex practices, The AIDS Trilogy features interviewees who approached the AIDS crisis in a variety of ways throughout the late 1980s and early 1990s.

Join us from 6:00 to 6:30 pm before each screening for a reception and tour of our Queer as German Folk exhibit. Following the first two films, we are pleased to be joined by long-time staff from Whitman-Walker Health, who will talk about their experiences working with the HIV-positive and LGBT communities in DC.

July 18, 2019, 6:00 pm: Pt. I Silence = Death (Schweigen ist gleich Tod)

@ Goethe-Institut Washington

In the first part of the trilogy, a statement by Texas' Governor, caught on an open microphone, summarizes Praunheim's perspective on America's attitude towards the millions of HIV-positive Americans: "If you want to stop AIDS ... then shoot the queers." Silence = Death brings together a multitude of short portraits that impress with their radicalness and openness. Focusing primarily on the response of New York artists to the AIDS Epidemic, Rosa von Praunheim's cautious and yet demanding interview technique moves his subjects to reveal themselves.

July 25, 2019, 6:00 pm: Pt. II Positive (Positiv)

@ Goethe-Institut Washington

Positive - HIV-positive, to be precise - describes most of the New Yorkers, whom Rosa von Praunheim interviewed in this documentary about how they managed life with AIDS. But positive also refers to a mental outlook that does not surrender to one's own dismay. Throughout The AIDS Trilogy the interviewees are portrayed as members of a resistance movement that rebels against the supposed fatality of the illness from which they suffer.

August 27, 2019, 6:00 pm: Pt. III The Fire Under Your Ass (Feuer unterm Arsch)

@ Goethe-Institut Washington

The third film of The AIDS Trilogy is dedicated to the German gay community, who is not interested in "Safe Sex" - much less the safer sex "with Mother Earth," which Allen Ginsberg envisioned for dealing with a planet contaminated by AIDS. In Berlin, the gay capital of Germany, Praunheim encounters a persistent party atmosphere and attitudes which reject the notion of safe sex.

Please RSVP to each screening via Eventbrite.