VIVONO is the first institutional exhibition to reconstruct the forgotten history of Italian artists affected by the HIV-AIDS crisis. Works of art, poetry, soundscapes, and videos are interwoven with archival materials and personal memories to chart a possible path through the years 1982 to 1996—from the first reported case of AIDS in Italy to the arrival of antiretroviral therapies—conveying both the urgency and the uniqueness of that time.
The exhibition unfolds within the historic rooms of Centro Pecci, which, between 1992 and 1994, hosted numerous exhibitions, cultural events, and social initiatives to fight stigma and misinformation around AIDS. Today, in the museum’s permanent collection show, Eccentrica, it holds Commemuro (1993), an artwork created in memory of friends lost to AIDS, by Francesco Torrini. 
On display also works by international artists. Featured are pieces that, when shown in Italy between 1982 and 1996, had a significant impact on the artistic community or activist movements: Gran Fury’s posters, exhibited at the 1990 Venice Biennale (and shown in Italy now for the first time since then), are placed in dialogue with works by Keith Haring; the blue sheer curtains by Félix Gonzalez-Torres (originally presented at Castello di Rivara in 1991) are shown alongside works by David Wojnarowicz and Walter Robinson, brought to Milan by Corrado Levi in 1984.