Founder of Phoenix chapter of ACT UP dies

Bruce Kurtz, founder of the Phoenix chapter of ACT UP, died of AIDS-related complications Saturday at a Tempe, Ariz., hospice, The Arizona Republic reports. He was 59. Kurtz was best known in the city for spearheading a 1990 protest in which ACT UP attached condoms and a protest note to 2,000 newsstand issues of The Arizona Republic in response to a cartoon in the newspaper that the AIDS activists considered offensive. Kurtz had served as the contemporary art curator at the Phoenix Art Museum until his retirement in 1994, at which point he moved to Paris. He returned to Phoenix in June 2002 to live in an assisted living facility. He had been in hospice care during the week prior to his death. Kurtz is survived by his parents and a brother, all of Palo Alto, Calif., and a son, Kreg Kurtz, of Arlington, Va. A memorial service is planned at the Phoenix Art Museum from 5 to 7 p.m. Thursday.