Eric Rhein's Work Reflects Nearly 3 Decades Living With HIV/AIDS

The Guardian
1997, wire and paper.

(Collection of Dr. Paul Bellman – Gift)

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R.O.T.C.
1987, wire, sued, leather, brocade fabric, and found objects.

“With long-term survivorship of HIV and AIDS being analogous to living though war I see creating R.O.T.C. just prior to my testing HIV positive as a premonition of the years to come.”

(Included in The Course of My Life at Johnson & Johnson)

Spirit
1989-1991, silver gelatin print on fiber paper, lacquered frame.

“As with my other photographs Spirit was taken with my mothers pre–digital Nikon. A period phone-line add from The Village Voice lines the bottom of my Great Grandmothers birdcage. Spirit currently hangs on my bedroom wall."

Bill
1997, assorted wire, found object, nylon thread and glue.

(Collection of The Leslie-Lohman Museum of Gay and Lesbian Art)

View – Ted Mats Me
(Hospital Drawing, Saint Vincent’s Hospital)
1994, magic marker.

“View is among a series of works on paper created during my 1994 “Artist in Residency” at Saint Vincent’s Hospital. Through the window I identified my visiting friends in the architecture, with me as the World Trade Center.”

“This series of rough and tender Hospital Drawings are nested together awaiting special projects.”

(Included in The Course of My Life at Johnson & Johnson)

Uncle Lige’s Sword
1998, wire, paper, and found objects.

“Uncle Lige’s Sword is named for my Uncle Lige Clarke a pioneer in the Gay Rights movement of the 1960’s and 70’s. The miniature sword in the structure supporting book pages about white blood cells belonged to him. It’s through his guardianship that I contextualize themes of HIV and AIDS in my work, as a means of activism.”

(Included in The Course of My Life at Johnson & Johnson)

Milky Way

2006, wire, paper and found objects.

"Milky Way comes through my series Blood Works to open abstraction that brings together the scientific with the metaphysical, the known and the unknown, the tangible with the ephemeral."

(Included in The Course of My Life at Johnson & Johnson)

Muscular System

2007, wire and paper.

(Included in The Course of My Life at Johnson & Johnson)

Hummingbirds - Installation of Six

2014, wire and paper.

"The Aztecs believed that hummingbird were the spirits of warriors, their presence having the ability to transform internal and external conflict."

(Included in The Course of My Life at Johnson & Johnson)

Their Courage

1996, wire and objects.

Eric Rhein at work in his studio, 2008.

Photo: Meaghan Major

Leaves

Wire and paper. Varied Dimensions.

Ongoing work: 1996 to the present.

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