Where a painting might have been, museum staff members hung a blank black canvas.

And where a visitor might have sat, officials set up an empty chair.

That's how two of Harvard's art centers commemorated victims of AIDS yesterday, in the first annual "A Day Without Art," part of worldwide AIDS Awareness Day.

Both the Harvard University Art Museum and the Carpenter Center for Visual Arts participated in the international observance, which was organized by the World Health Organization.

At the Fogg Art Museum, 76 empty chairs stood, each symbolizing an AIDS victim whom museum staff members knew.

"These are people we know, giving it a very personalized type of feeling. I put in four names," said Marian A. Myszkowski, coordinator for Member and Public Programs at the Harvard UniversityArt Museum.

And in the nearby Carpenter Center, staffmembers hung panels of blank black and white paperwhich "symbolized the unrealized potential ofartists that died with AIDS," said Cynthia Hadzi,exhibition coordinator at the center.

"We want people to come and see this. It wouldbe quite a jolt," Hadzi said.

Hadzi said the Carpenter Center exhibit willremain in the downstairs lobby gallery until themiddle of next week. The Fogg Museum exhibit,however, was taken down yesterday, since themuseum needed to make room for a Rembrandt show,Myszkowski said.

Museum and center officials said that VisualAids of New England, a group coordinating AIDScommemorations in the art community, encouragedthe Harvard centers to set up their tributes.

Other Commemorations

Harvard organizations outside the artscommunity also commemorated AIDS Awareness Day.

The student-run AIDS Education Outreach (AEO)program brought an AIDS victim to speak at theWinthrop House Junior Common Room last night.

AEO Co-director Michael S. Bonner '90 said hehoped the speaker would help students rememberthat AIDS is "an issue for the young.