mandywebb66's blog

My apologies for taking so long to write but I set myself a project back in August and this was to go one step further with my ‘GrenAIDS’ I created last year. Those were ready-made Toy Grenades which I adorned with handmade HIV medication and jewels to represent three of my HIV regimes that I have updated and constantly adhered to since diagnosis back in 2002. I nearly lost the War against HIV/AIDS with a CD4 count of 40 and a Viral Load so huge that there were far too many zeros so I fail to remember the exact number? I nearly lost the war as I didn’t have any inkling that there was a battle...

The Red Ribbon Dress had two great events last year. Firstly it was invited along to The Sussex Beacon Gala Celebrity Event and appeared in the window of Waterstone's Book Shop in Gower Street, London for World AIDS Day. Both events very different but all about Raising Awareness and getting Dedications for the Book. This year seems to be moving really quickly. My Auntie told me many years ago that when you get older, time goes by so much quicker...and she’s not wrong, it seems to be flying by sometimes so fast that it’s hard for me to catch up with it and know what month we’re in? Back in...

This month of November and this Year of 2012 is my 10 th Anniversary of being diagnosed HIV Positive. Back in 2002 when I was finally diagnosed, I never thought I would be living 10 years on? Just getting through each day seemed traumatic, worried I would miss a dose of my Meds, scared to fall asleep to not wake up again but strangely also hoping that I wouldn’t wake up! My life had been turned upside down, something inside me had been slowly killing me and even though I had been back and forth to my G.P. nothing was explainable, even making out that it was all in my head!!! The first year was...

This project (See my blog about the Red Ribbon Dress) originally began in 2004/05 and was as a sort of ‘Coming Out’ piece about being HIV Positive and was made for my end of year show. The Original was sculptural and included Chicken wire mesh to create the skirt, a plaster cast of a mannequin's torso for the body and a T-Shirt printed with the words ‘Gay, Straight, Doesn’t Discriminate’ emblazoned across the front. This piece was exhibited and moved around many times and became damaged. It had looked so grand when it was first shown but became bent and Ribbons fell off. Idecided to re-create...

I was invited along to a HIV Support Group this month, a Woman’s group. I was asked along because of the Artwork I create and because of the fact that I am ‘Out’ and ‘Proud’ about who I am and how Empowered I have become over these years by disclosing my Positive Status and creating pieces of artwork from sometimes ignorant hurtful comments from mostly professional people, people in the Medical profession. People who quite frankly should know better! I took along lots of images of my work and just talked about where I was then back in 2002 and where I am now in 2012. Back in 2002, I was in a...

Well it’s been a while, but I’m back and inspired to write my blog. It’s now February 2012 and the year has really flown by…Good and bad events that have marked this year as an anniversary of a House move and the Passing of my Uncle. And also a year of Exhibiting Art in the West End of London which has been a new experience and the meeting of new friends/contacts. The last few months I have been stitching many, many Red Ribbons…the total at this point in time is 4026 and I will continue as the Dress Template is only near completion for the fitting and once that’s done, we can crack on with the...

This year 2011 has been my 10th World AIDS Day as one of the survivors of this wicked ugly disease. I went a long time undiagnosed, flying under the radar so to speak but this disease even then unknowingly of my own status has had a massive impact on me. Not in the sense that I had lost anyone close to me, I’d never met anyone Positive until I was diagnosed. But I watched as many others on the TV the sad deaths of Rock Hudson, the papers reporting that Freddie Mercury had AIDS in those big scary letters filling the headline of the paper and the next day when it was reported that he, too, had...

First I must apologize for taking so long to blog. Life has been a little crazy. I am now represented by a new gallery in the West End of London, in Nottinghill so there have been many trips back and forth delivering work, going to Preview nights and attending workshops and even a 121 with the Gallery Director. This is an exciting new venture for me and I have to commit one hundred percent to it. I have also just finished a course at the wonderful Pallant House Gallery in Chichester. It was a training programme learning how to run workshops, as I have to create a job for myself that fits in...

Whatever people say, however they say it….being HIV Positive is a Life Sentence….That is, if you are one of the lucky ones that is in receipt of HIV medication. I didn’t have much choice in the matter when it came to discussing the HIV medication that was to become my savior. I was admitted to hospital in the 3rd stage of an AIDS diagnosis and it was pretty much touch and go if I would survive as the virus had viciously attacked my immune system, a system already compromised as I had had my spleen removed 10 years prior. It was also suspected I had TB as I had a really awful cough/chest...

Back in 2006 while I was starting my first year of my Fine Art Degree, I was given the Project Brief: AUTOBIOGRAPHY. This was it, this was the time to disclose my status, this was the time to tell colleagues/friends that I had been on the Foundation course for the previous year about me…it was an either Break It or Make it situation…this was when I would find out who my real friends were and who to maybe avoid???? I sat with my rather oversized sketchbook opened out in front of me and where to begin… I entered the letters ME rather largely with a big black marker pen right dead in the centre...