Local Photographer Captures Plight Of Children Caught Up In Swaziland's AIDS Pandemic

Updated Feb. 4 at 2 p.m.
The opening of an exhibit featuring the work of Hoosier photographer Josef Kissinger has been rescheduled.

"Hope Seekers" will now open Feb. 12 in the Marsh Gallery at IUPUI's Herron School of Art and Design.

In conjunction with the exhibit,  Saving Orpans through Healthcare and Outreach (SOHO) will have a Solutions Event on Feb. 18 at Herron, where they will feature a model safe house developed in the School of Engineering & Technology. Students from Crispus Attucks who traveled to Swaziland last fall will share about the other related initiatives including a documentary.

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An exhibit featuring the work of Hoosier photographer Josef Kissinger will open Feb. 5 in the Marsh Gallery at IUPUI's Herron School of Art and Design.

“Hope Seekers,” produced in coordination with Indianapolis-based Saving Orphans through Healthcare and Outreach, documents child-led households in Swaziland. The country has the highest rate of HIV/AIDS cases in the world, with more than one in four people infected with the deadly disease. As a result, the number of households headed by children, some as young as eight years old, is exploding.

Kissinger’s photographs capture everyday life and intimate, emotional moments of these children forced to grow up quickly in the shadow of the AIDS pandemic. They have also been incorporated in a book that shares the name of the exhibit.

You can see some of the photos, and hear from Kissinger in this video.

The exhibition’s opening event will be Wednesday, Feb. 5 at 6 p.m. in the Marsh Gallery at the Herron School of Art and Design. It is free and open to the public. In addition to the gallery exhibit, there will be a forum in the school’s Basile Auditorium addressing the issues surrounding child-led households and the impact of the AIDS pandemic in Swaziland, as well as the use of art to bring about social change.

"Hope Seekers" will run through Feb. 22.