/ 18 July 2006

In a world of HIV

On World Aids Day, a global public service campaign entitled We All Have Aids was launched. A black-and-white photograph features 24 of the world’s most prominent figures in politics, science and entertainment who are all committed to fighting the pandemic. Of the 24, three are South African: Zackie Achmat, Archbishop Desmond Tutu and former president Nelson Mandela.

The name Kenneth Cole has always been synonymous with designer shoes, but the label has evolved into a powerful global fashion and fragrance brand. The Kenneth Cole brand philosophy, however, couldn’t be more different to that of its peers in the fashion arena. ‘To be aware is more important than what you wear” is a company mantra that has ensured that the Kenneth Cole name stands for more than just fabulous footwear. The designer is known for ad campaigns that rely less on visuals and more on pithy social commentary like, ‘Imelda Marcos bought 2 700 pairs of shoes. She could at least have had the courtesy to buy one of ours.”

In his flagship store on Fifth Avenue in New York, customers are greeted by the words, ‘You are on a video camera over 20 times a day. Are you dressed for it?” stencilled across the wall. It makes you stop and think, which is just the way Cole likes it.

Cole is more than just a designer; he’s a respected philanthropist.

Over the past two decades he has continued to use his advertising campaigns to draw attention to numerous causes including: the homeless, women’s rights, gun safety and even voter apathy. But his main concern is the Aids pandemic. He was the first designer to use a fashion platform to draw attention to the Aids crisis.

As early as 1985, two years before the United States government even acknowledged the disease, he sponsored a public service campaign using the top models of the day, all posing with children. The copy for the ad read: ‘For the future of our children. Support the American Foundation of Aids research. We do.”

Three years later he ran another campaign that simply featured a pair of baby shoes with the words: ‘This year, because of Aids, hundreds of Americans won’t live long enough to fill these shoes.” Five years later he ran the same campaign again, but simply crossed out the word ‘hundreds” and scribbled over it ‘thousands”.

Sadly, 20 years later, the need to champion the cause has not abated.

Cole’s social activism has led to a close collaboration with the American Foundation for Aids Research (Amfar), of which he was appointed chairperson of the board this year. The We All Have Aids campaign is an Amfar initiative, but personally financed by Cole. His aim? To make this global campaign the largest in the history of the disease. He has already received the support from media giants such as Time Warner and Viacom, who have all pledged free coverage on billboards, bus shelters, in magazines and newspapers, as well as on television and radio.

The message is quite simple: ‘We all have Aids … if one of us does.”

But besides spreading awareness and, more importantly, striving to destigmatise the disease, the campaign is also an attempt to consolidate and find common ground between Aids organisations (1 800 in the US), hence the high-profile collective of the campaign’s participants. Each person heads up his or her own foundation or organisation. The logistics must have been a nightmare.

Even the South Africans had to pose separately. Cole and photographer Mark Seliger began snapping some of the celebrities in New York, then had to travel to Los Angeles, where the majority of the actors had assembled for the Academy Awards, and then on to Cape Town and George, where they were finally able to catch up with Mandela and Achmat at the 46664 concert.

Each person was asked to pose barefoot for the photograph and make an imprint of their feet in wet cement, much like the handprints of the movie stars on Hollywood’s walk of fame. Madiba was the only one to decline, and when asked about it Cole simply responded by saying, ‘We managed to get Nelson Mandela to agree to participate, so no, we didn’t push our luck.”

The photographs from the campaign, as well as the cement footprints, form part of a public exhibition that was unveiled on World Aids Day in New York’s Bryant Park.

To boost and support the campaign a website (www.weallhaveaids.com) will be launched. This is the first global listing of Aids organisations, care facilities and testing centres. It will also provide advice and information on HIV. If the United Nations’s projections (100-million new infections by the year 2020) are accurate, then this website is desperately needed. However, it is hoped that through global campaigns like this, two-thirds of those forecasted infections could be prevented.

Cynics see ‘celebrity activism” as just an alternative means of self-promotion, but since we live in a world where people are obsessed with celebrity, we may as well make use of the medium while it lasts. But for a man like Cole these campaigns have never been a quest for 15 minutes of fame. His parting shot, in his book Footnotes, says it all: ‘It’s great to be known for shoes, better to be known for your sole.”

The websites

www.weallhaveaids.com

www.knowHIVAIDS.org

www.kaisernetwork.org

www.kff.org

www.kennethcole.com

The celebrity activists

  • Zackie Achmat — Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) leader
  • Dr David Baltimore — California Institute of Technology
  • Harry Belafonte — United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef) goodwill ambassador
  • eigh Blake — Founder, president and CEO, Keep a Child Alive

  • Bono — Founder of DATA (TBD)
  • Richard Gere — Founder of The Gere Foundation, board member of Healing the Divide, sponsor of Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric Aids Foundation, amfAR and Aids Research Alliance
  • Whoopi Goldberg — Goodwill ambassador for the American Health Foundation
  • Tom Hanks — Ambassador to Freeplay Foundation
  • Elton John and David Furnish — Elton John Aids Foundation
  • Ashley Judd — Board of directors for PSI YouthAids
  • Kami — Five-year-old Muppet from Takalani Sesame, the South African adaptation of Sesame Street who is HIV-positive.
  • Alicia Keys — Spokesperson for Keep a Child Alive
  • Larry Kramer — Founder of Gay Men’s Health Crisis
  • Mathilde Krim — Founding chairperson of amFAR
  • Nelson Mandela — Nelson Mandela Children’s Fund
  • Eric McCormack — Project Angelfood
  • Rosie O’Donnell — Founder, Rosie’s Broadway Kids
  • Natasha Richardson — National Aids Trust ambassador
  • Will Smith — Ambassador for the Nelson Mandela Foundation who hosted Mandela’s 2005 46664 concert
  • Dr Suniti Solomon — Set up first voluntary youth testing and counselling centre and Aids Research Group in Chennai
  • Sharon Stone — Chairperson, amfAR’s Campaign for Aids Research
  • Elizabeth Taylor — Founding international chairperson of amfAR and the founder of the Elizabeth Taylor Aids Foundation.
  • Archbishop Desmond Tutu — Global Aids Alliance