News and Views

When I read the many articles about Alana Chen, who was reportedly pressured into conversion therapy to change her sexuality, I knew I had to paint her image.

My experience with AIDS patients was that they felt the adult Jesus was angry or judgmental towards them. So I’d tell them: “Why not hold the Baby Jesus and talk to Him?”

My first visit to a man dying of AIDS left me staggering onto the streets of New York. He was lying in a bed, visibly emaciated, with his mother on one side of him and his lover on the other. Both were weeping.

From this journey into gay history, a flood of colored pencil drawings came rushing out of me. I was pouring my soul out and my own healing journey began.