On March 11 during a Facebook Live, PWN announced the winners of the Celebrate and Honor Black Women in the HIV Movement Art Contest. The first prize went to Lorangelis Thomas Negron who created the painting pictured above titled, “Me Exploro Y Conecto.” This piece belongs to a collection (Fluir Mas) by the artist in which she uses her menstrual blood to paint. She explains that cisgender women living with HIV are often afraid of transmitting the virus because of their menstrual cycle. Her art reflects the cycles of life women living with HIV face.

The second prize winner was Reverend Joyce McDonald for her sculpture, Compassion, in which she expresses not only the pain and trauma of her past life but also the joy and triumph of her current life. With this piece, Joyce decided she would not be a victim but a survivor. As a survivor of substance addiction, sex work, and kidnapping, Joyce has dealt with a lot of personal losses as she explained in the video. This piece speaks to her life as a caregiver. She led an AIDS ministry at her church and oftentimes sat with those who were dying of AIDS-related complications, overdoses, and most recently COVID-19. Thank you so much for sharing your journey with us through your art.

The third prize winner was Connie Johnson for her beautiful poem, “Blood Sisters.” You can catch her oral submission here starting at 20:49 in the video. For Connie, writing is life. It is that sustaining energy that fuels her to be able to share herself with the world. She gets to share her most intimate thoughts with the world through writing.