THE AIDS CRISIS IS RIDICULOUS AND OTHER WRITINGS: 1986-2003, by Gregg Bordowitz, edited by James Meyer with an essay by Douglas Crimp

MIT Press, 2004, First edition, 307 pp., 7 1/4" X 9 1/4", Hardcover

Fine

The HIV epidemic animates this collection of essays by a noted artist, writer, and activist. "So total was the burden of illness—mine and others'—that the only viable response, other than to cease making art entirely, was to adjust to the gravity of the predicament by using the crisis as a lens," writes Gregg Bordowitz, a film- and video-maker whose best-known works, Fast Trip Long Drop (1993) and Habit (2001), address AIDS globally and personally. In The AIDS Crisis Is Ridiculous—the title essay is inspired by Charles Ludlam, founder of the Ridiculous Theater Company—Bordowitz follows in the tradition of artist-writers Robert Smithson and Yvonne Rainer by making writing an integral part of an artistic practice.