“Billy Howard’s ‘Epitaphs for the Living’ ” features photographs, each showing a person with HIV/AIDS—or their loved one—and a handwritten message from that person about living with the disease.

“Strength and determination are the qualities that come through these photographs,” says Randy Gue, curator of modern political and historical collections at the Stuart A. Rose Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Book Library, which is home to Howard’s photograph collection. He cites a letter from one photo subject to Howard that reads in part, “Ever the optimist, I plan on beginning graduate school (for a master’s in social work) next January.”

Billy Howard photographs, Stuart A. Rose Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Book Library, Emory University.