Wojnarowicz was also connected to other prolific artists of the time, appearing in or collaborating on works with artists including Nan Goldin, Peter Hujar, Luis Frangella, Karen Finley, Kiki Smith, Richard Kern, James Romberger, Marguerite Van Cook, Ben Neill, Marion Scemama, and Phil Zwickler. In 1987 his longtime mentor and lover, the photographer Peter Hujar, died of AIDS, and Wojnarowicz himself learned that he was HIV-positive. Hujar's death moved Wojnarowicz to create much more explicit activism and political content, notably about the injustices, social and legal, in the response to the AIDS epidemic.