The project is to create a permanent memorial to those in Dorset who have lost their lives to AIDS. At the time the project was initiated, these numbered over 200 and the number is still growing. By creating this memorial, DAMSET aims to bring home to the wider community the fact that the virus is active everywhere and spares nobody if adequate precautions are not taken.
Grants from Awards for All and the Community Foundation Local Network Fund have enabled us to engage a professional artist to conduct workshops for secondary school children in which each student is given the name of one person from Dorset whose life has been cut short by AIDS. The class teacher then encourages the students to discuss HIV and what it means to them, whilst they are creating a tile design. In this way, the students are made aware that HIV/AIDS is both a world-wide problem and right on their own doorsteps. The students are encouraged to have ownership of the project and pass the message of HIV/AIDS awareness and not the infection.
The tiles will be assembled to form the memorial wall at Pier Approach, Bournemouth.
It is intended that the memorial be a community-wide project. It will be a permanent and potent reminder to the public at large and particularly to the young people involved, that the incidence of HIV/AIDS has not gone away and that new infections are on the increase.
We aim to unveil the memorial for World AIDS Day 2010.
