The UK AIDS Memorial Quilt Needs a Permanent Home

Siobhán Lanigan began working at the pioneering HIV treatment centre London Lighthouse in 1992, after the AIDS-related death of her housemate, the musician and actor David Dipnall. ‘He died within six months of his diagnosis. He was only 24,’ she tells me. ‘You can imagine what that was like.’ At the centre, she regularly sat in on quilt-making workshops, though it wasn’t until 2013 that she saw the completed UK AIDS Memorial Quilt – languishing in a cupboard at George House Trust in Manchester, where, untouched for many years, it had begun to deteriorate. 

When the Quilt is laid out in the Turbine Hall at Tate Modern, London, this week, it will mark the first time it has been displayed in its entirety at one of the UK’s flagship cultural institutions. Comprising 42 quilts and 23 individual panels, the Quilt forms a powerful tribute to nearly 400 UK residents lost to AIDS-related illnesses, hand-stitched by their friends, lovers, communities and, occasionally, family members. For the many thousands of people who have contributed to the Quilt, this display is a significant milestone, but for an object so integral – and so deeply precious – to the history of HIV/AIDS in the UK, it is galling to learn of its precarious past, not to mention its uncertain future.

Scottish LGBTQ+ activist Alastair Hume first conceived of it in 1989, after seeing the US Quilt in San Francisco and meeting its originator, Cleve Jones. Back in Edinburgh, Hume set up a UK chapter to receive and stitch together the panels into their distinctive 182 × 91 cm format, chosen to reflect the size of a typical grave plot. After the discovery of effective antiretrovirals in 1995, the Quilt was placed in storage, where it remained for nearly 20 years. It was only when Lanigan and her colleagues sounded the alarm in 2013 that a partnership of seven HIV charities came together to preserve it – and to begin accepting new panels once more.

Among its recent additions is a panel made by Keith Heywood for his partner, Derek St Louis, who passed away in 1988. ‘Peckham is where Derek arrived from the Caribbean in 1966 – and it’s also very much how I remember him: a Peckham boy,’ he says, explaining the flag of Dominica and the Peckham tube station roundel he has painted on his design. Completed in 2023, St Louis’s panel joins those remembering the likes of activist Mark Ashton, actor Ian Charleson and singer Freddie Mercury. ‘Derek was an extrovert – and I always knew he would have liked to be part of the Quilt.’

At Tate, visitors will have the chance to examine closely the handwritten notes, photographs and scraps of clothing taped to each panel. But, looking down on the Quilt from the Turbine Hall Bridge will underscore the scale of the loss. ‘It speaks very softly of lots of different lives,’ says Lanigan. ‘But, when you see all of them together as a whole, it speaks loudly about where we were then.’ A previously unseen documentary by Peter Martin, There Is a Light That Never Goes Out (1994), featuring rare footage from the Quilt’s public unveiling at Hyde Park Corner in June 1994, will be screened alongside in the Starr Cinema.

Welcome though this display is, Lanigan does not intend for the Quilt to enter Tate’s permanent collection, where its panels might be conserved but also removed from public display for long periods. Like its larger, better-funded US counterpart, she envisions the UK Quilt as a living memorial: one that circulates around the country, touching down in community centres, schools and other public spaces, where it can inspire awareness, remembrance and protest. 

For that to happen, the Quilt needs funding – urgently – to repair those parts where the fabric is worn or the ink has faded, though Lanigan believes more must be done to safeguard its future. ‘It needs its own premises, with a room big enough to open the panels and work on them for conservation,’ she explains. While a permanent London AIDS memorial designed by artist Anya Gallaccio is due to be unveiled in 2027, the UK AIDS Memorial Quilt has, for more than four decades, fulfilled that role – an unofficial national monument, crafted and cared for by the communities most impacted by the epidemic. Securing it a dedicated home, where its panels can be preserved and displayed for future generations, is as vital as it is long overdue. ‘It only needs Elton John to decide he wants to look after it,’ Lanigan adds.

Until then, the Quilt will be boxed up after its display at Tate and returned to its current home at Positive East, London, where it is cared for by a small but committed team of volunteers and conservators, with Lanigan at the helm. She expects new panels will arrive in the wake of the display, bringing with them fresh stories from an epidemic that is far from over. ‘Maybe one day there will be a panel for David,’ she muses. ‘Though it feels to me like all the work I do around the Quilt is for him.’

The UK AIDS Memorial Quilt will be on display at Tate Modern 12–16 June. There is an accompanying programme of events, including readings, discussions and workshops.  

^{Main image courtesy: UK AIDS Memorial Quilt Partnership}