In the 1980s and 1990s, doctors, nurses, funeral homes and family members sometimes refused care to people with AIDS due to fear and stigma. In the gay community, activists and friends often stepped forward to fill this void, tending to the ill, preparing their bodies after death and organising remembrances to ensure that the departed were treated with dignity. This lineage of intimate communal care continues today in the LGBTQ+ community, especially for trans people whose family members might misgender them after death.
In this animated short, the London-based filmmaker Mariana Leal explores this legacy of care with a delicate, thoughtful touch, offering glimpses of ceremonies that feel personal, intimate and closely attuned to the lives they commemorate. The piece was developed in dialogue with the British social anthropologist Hannah Rumble, who specialises in ‘death, dying and disposal’, and was in part inspired by the Death Positive Movement, which aims to reframe and remove taboos around death in society.
