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The South African AIDS situation

2016 Competition entry

Cari Niehaus

Details:
Not Signed
Glass, resin
1.3 m x 10 cm

Description:

This is a visual depiction of the current situation where South Africans find themselves in 2016. This sculpture is made from a glass panel that stretches out with 20 male and female plugs on it, cast out of resin.  

The plug concept can be linked to sexual intercourse between a male and a female. The way genitals are designed to “fit” into each other, can also refer to different parts of a plug, and how they also fit into each other. In this sculpture, 20% of the plugs are full of red materials such as ribbon, newspaper cuttings, thread and red ink to symbolise blood infected with HIV.  With so much AIDS awareness raised over the last couple of years, it seems as if people should know by now how not to get infected by this life-threatening virus.

However the current statistics show otherwise, for at present 15.5% of people are infected with HIV, babies are born with it every day and HIV is still sometimes being transferred to patients in unsanitary hospitals. South Africa is believed to have more people with HIV/AIDS than any other country in the world. It is estimated that 5,700,000 South Africans have HIV/AIDS, and the number of infected is larger than in any other country in the world.

Therefore in this sculpture, I want to comment on the ridiculously great percentages of HIV, abortions and unwanted pregnancies in South Africa as a result of unprotected sex.