#thegatesfoundation

For starters, no one wants to see the needles, band aids and shrieking toddlers, who have an uncanny ability to transport us back to our own aichmophobic episodes, à la covers of doctors’ office “literature.” Plus, we’ve become rather numb to advertisements when they look like advertisements. Think of it like this - when you’re scrolling through your now ad-saturated Facebook newsfeed, you can easily detect the difference between a company’s ad post and friend activity (even as marketers try to make their material look “natural”). In the case of The Art of Saving a Life, the works of art produced by artists across varying forms of media, disengage themselves with generic forms of promotional, awareness-raising material and instead intrigue us into their (very very honorable) cause. 

A tableau of a vaccination. Alexia Sinclair {photo via The NYT}

In an earlier article from The New York Times, Melena Ryzik notes that the campaign “brings a fashion-y aesthetic” to disease, presumably a rather unfashionable topic. To Ryzik’s point, photographer Alexia Sinclair referenced her Tableau of Vaccination, explaining that she “wanted to create something that looked at smallpox, but did it in a way that didn’t repulse people.” Her composition, complete with an Alexander McQueen-esque gown-makeup-hair combo, a dreamy field of lavender giving rise to eighteenth century salon shelves, and a doctor seemingly plucked from a Hogarth print, is decidedly compelling. Bravo, Alexia.   Secondly, this effort is brilliant because of its smartly placed focus on harnessing the power of art as a conversation starter. Truth: you don’t have to “get” art to talk about it. In fact, many of the conversations I’ve been in concerning art have sprung from the very not-getting-it nature of it all (yes I’m looking at you man at the Ellsworth Kelly exhibit). Whether in a more personal dinner-party sense or in a larger socio-political vein (pun intended), art makes people open their mouths, and in the case of 

The Art of Saving a Life

, discuss vaccination. Bill, Melinda, and the artists they have commissioned know this and are welcoming others into an important and often heated conversation surrounding inoculations, their inaccessibility for many, and their importance to all.  In a poetic nod to virality, you can take part in the discussion by using the hashtag #VaccinesWork across social media. To learn more about the artists involved and works created, visit this