As one of the first artistic confrontations with AIDS, Nicholas Nixon's intimate series of portraits People with AIDS was controversial in the late 1980s. Nixon captured his subjects with dignity and respect at a time when people with AIDS had generally been derided and victimized. Nixon, working with an 8x10-inch camera, shot images that are crisply detailed and powerfully sentimental. Although this bulky camera would have been somewhat awkward to use, Nixon's photographs have a snapshot quality, a testament to his talent and skill.

 Joey Brandon with his Parents, Zena and Everett Cloy, Boston, Oct., 1987 is the first of four photographs documenting the last months of Joey Brandon's struggle with the disease. In this image he is still in a state of relatively good health. As each photograph in the series shows the deterioration not only in Brandon's physical condition, but also in his spirit, Nixon demonstrates the power of photography to capture the passage of time through portraiture. Nixon is most famous for his series The Brown Sisters, a project that documents four sisters with one photograph every year. The MFAH owns the complete series of both People with AIDS and The Brown Sisters, among other prints by Nixon.