Speaking the T.R.U.T.H. for More Than a Decade

As a youth, isolation was no stranger to Kevin Anderson. And early in his adult life, an HIV diagnosis brought an even deeper sense of isolation. But Anderson’s innate sense of creativity became the silver lining that helped him heal. Sharing his narrative through a creative lens, Anderson has helped countless others find connection and joy. In 2013, he launched the T.R.U.T.H. Project (Telling Real Unapologetic Truth Through Healing).

The Project’s mission is to educate and mobilize LGBTQ communities of color and their allies through social arts that promote mental, emotional, and sexual health. After turning 50 last month, Anderson shared his life story with OutSmart and explained how his painful early years motivated him to reach out and help others in deeply profound ways.

An Introverted Childhood

Anderson was born in 1975 in Long Beach, California. He was raised by a single mother, who did everything she could to give him a life where he had everything he needed. She often had to work two jobs as a special-needs educator and in various retail stores. Anderson’s first job was delivering newspapers, a job that required him to be up at 5:00 to start rolling the papers.

When Anderson was in the third grade, his mother married his first stepfather. “He was very bright, but he was also an alcoholic,” Anderson says. As issues arose, his mother often had to move. “There was a lot of movement in my life, and it felt very nomadic at times.” One year, he went to four different schools. “I was a latchkey kid. There was a lot of instability, but she was always my rock.”

With so much happening around him, Anderson became very introverted. In his early years, he was often perceived as being a bit feminine. He didn’t like the rough and tumble of football, preferring to spend recess times with the girls. He even learned the “Double Dutch” jump-rope game that was popular with the girls. Two long ropes were swung in opposite directions at the same time, requiring the jumper to jump in and clear both ropes in rhythm.

Girls found him to be gentle and a good listener. “Some of them had crushes on me,” Anderson recalls. “The bulk of my friends were girls.” But the boys teased him, and his stepfather would belittle him during drunken rages. “He called me a ‘faggot’ with the greatest of ease. I didn’t know exactly what that was, but I knew it was bad, and it meant I wasn’t a man.” He found solace by creating his own private world and doing a lot of drawing. 

As he grew older, Anderson made friends with other boys who shared his creative interests. “But then they were often out of my life rather quickly,” he remembers, making reference to his frequent moves. One boy was his first crush. Once a week they were allowed to go to the local mall after school, where they would play air hockey or visit an art gallery.     

In Love with Art

As he grew older, Anderson thrived in his art, history, and English classes. He also enjoyed classes in astronomy and other subjects that were not popular with most other boys.  “Overall, I was an average student,” he says. “I excelled in classes I enjoyed, but subjects like math brought down my GPA.”

Although he was shy and somewhat overweight, Anderson says he was “a good kid” who spent a lot of time with adults, carrying on conversations on an adult level. “My relationship with my mother was more like siblings than mother and son. She was my safe space, and I was hers. I felt she always created happiness and joy in our space together.”

Race was not that big an issue for Anderson. Life in California was very multicultural, but gang activity was a problem. He remembers being jumped one day. He was hit in the head and a chain he was wearing was stolen. That incident pushed him even deeper into his isolated world. 

Anderson found special joy in going into homes that were being built and sketching out the floor plan. “For so many years, I wanted to be an architect,” he says. He also enjoyed visiting local museums with his mother, going to the beach with her, and playing cards.

Anderson has always enjoyed music. During his teen years, he loved Janet and Michael Jackson and joined the school boys’ choir.  Though still not interested in most sports, he made the school wrestling team.

In the Navy 

After graduating, Anderson felt like it was time to detach from the safety net of his mother, and he enlisted in the Navy. He had always loved the water, and he liked the idea of following in the footsteps of a friend of his mother, of a former Navy man who had always treated him like a little brother.

In the Navy, Anderson  entered an apprenticeship with the quartermasters and became a navigator. Positioned behind the captain, he worked with a team that plotted the ship’s course. “I was using GPS before it was made public,” he says. “It was only for the military.”    

Anderson’s first ship had a crew of 100, and he ended up on one with 900. During his four years in the Navy, he visited Hawaii, Europe, and Africa. “It was a great time of discovery for me,” he says. “I was learning to navigate my own life.” It was during this time that he had his first same-gender sexual experience, with a man he met while off duty.

Anderson recalls his Navy years as a time of “intense isolation.” It was the era of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” and he had to hide his sexual orientation. He remembers two sailors who “just disappeared” after they were diagnosed with HIV. After his discharge, he finally visited his first gay bar in Norfolk, Virginia.

Gravitating to Houston

After leaving the Navy, Anderson moved to San Antonio, where his mother was living, and attended junior college there, thinking he might become an English teacher. He tried to make connections within the local art community but found it to be lacking in Black representation.

After junior college, Anderson enrolled in Prairie View A&M University and pursued special-needs education classes. With Houston slightly less than an hour’s drive from Prairie View, he visited the city quite often to visit art exhibitions and attend spoken-word open mics. In Houston’s thriving art community, he could see himself represented. 

He also had a weekend job as a house parent in the Brookwood Community in Brookshire, Texas, a space for special-needs adults where he worked for two years. “It aligned with what I was going to school for. I come from a line of educators, my grandmother and my mom,” he says. 

It was at this point in his life that Anderson was diagnosed with HIV. One of the ways he could get closer to others with the diagnosis was to volunteer at Houston’s Omega House hospice on Sunday mornings. “A lot of my character is being a caregiver, and the residents needed compassionate people more than ever at that point in their life,” he explains.

A Career in Public Health

His education and his interests easily led to a decision to pursue a career in public health. His first job was as a youth educator at the YWCA on Martin Luther King Blvd. in Houston. He worked there for a year, teaching middle school girl’s health and wellness, coping skills, and how to communicate effectively. 

His next post was at St. Hope Healthcare, which had just received funding from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) for a drop-in center for Black gay men aged 18 to 30. The center provided HIV and STI testing and offered support to those who were living with HIV.  St. Hope had a computer lab open to clients, and a place to take a shower for those who were unhoused.

“It’s interesting that these men were adults, but a lot of them needed the skills I was teaching at the YWCA. Black men had the largest number of HIV-positive testing outcomes,” he says. “These men were in the same position I was in when I was in the Navy, trying to learn to navigate life. I was providing them with the skills they needed, such as adhering to their medication regimens. The CDC felt that these centers were a good means of reducing the occurrence of HIV transmission.”

As an individual, Anderson saw that he was beginning to thrive because of his contributions to the community by helping others end the isolation they felt trapped in. That’s when he decided to create a men’s group that he named Brother to Brother. “It was a space that provided support to other Black men,” he says. “They were able to come together over a meal at a friend’s house and have conversations and group discussions.” 

 

Concentrating on Program Development

After three years with St. Hope, Anderson moved on to AIDS Foundation Houston (now named Allies in Hope), where he spent the next 13 years. He began working as a facilitator with the MSM (men who have sex with men) community. He was soon promoted to coordinator of MSM outreach as he immersed himself in program development. “I would check the pulse of the community by conducting surveys to find out what the needs were, and then put things together,” he explains.

Anderson continued to be active in the city’s art spaces, and one night at an open mic, a man expressed his love for another man. Other artists followed, and several of them used their time to belittle him. After that episode, Anderson stepped away from the open-mic scene for about a year.

While at St. Hope, Anderson had worked part-time bartending at Incognito (later known as Rockstar), the venue for the annual Houston Black Pride celebration. He asked the owner for permission to host a non-discriminatory open mic on Sunday nights. The response was positive, and the program became known as “heART&SOUL.” Today, it is one of the longest running queer-centered open mics. “I was working in public health, but I needed a creative outlet,” Anderson says. “We had singers, dancers, and spoken-word artists in a monthly showcase.”

A myriad of topics were expressed at the open mic. Some individuals shared their HIV status for the first time. Lesbians spoke about battling their ex-husbands for the kids. Some shared experiences of domestic abuse within same-gender relationships. Others simply shared the joy of queer love.

The Birth of T.R.U.T.H.

One day at work, Anderson wrote an acronym on a Post-it: Telling Real Unapologetic Truth Through Healing (T.R.U.T.H.). “I wanted to create a healing space where the arts could be utilized as a means for sexual and mental health. I had a lot on my plate, but I really wanted to birth this.”

His director at AIDS Foundation Houston (AFH) used to attend the heART&SOUL events. “One night I talked about my idea for the T.R.U.T.H. Project, and my director invited me to develop the concept within AFH. So for the first year and a half, it was part of AFH,” he says. “It was all very fresh and new. We began an initiative where people got tickets for an event if they would test for HIV and STI. The event was a concert featuring a variety of performers, including Grammy Award-winning singer Marsha Ambrosius. Each quarter, a new installment was presented, focusing on such topics as Pride, abuse, discrimination, bullying, coming out, HIV awareness, self-esteem, and trans awareness.”

At the end of 2012, the Project’s funding ended, and Anderson began working to make the T.R.U.T.H. Project an independent entity. He pulled together a board of directors, including Harris County Criminal Courts Judge Shannon Baldwin. By 2015, when the Project had received its nonprofit approval from the IRS, Anderson was creating fundraisers and found other means of supporting the Project.

The monthly heART&SOUL open mics provided Anderson with an audience that he could survey for community needs. “One of the things I realized was that the community wanted panel discussions,” he says. He was quick to begin organizing and presenting those panels. 

Expanding the Project

In September 2013, Anderson left AFH and became the CEO of the T.R.U.T.H Project, which is governed under what Anderson calls its three pillars: health and wellness, art and culture, and education and empowerment. 

On the first Saturday of the month, the Project sponsors Glow Up Yoga, a free wellness space focused on the mind and stress reduction. The P.L.U.S. United Support Circle, meeting on the third Thursday of the month, is a confidential support space for men and nonbinary people of color living with HIV. The heART&SOUL open mic continues to provide a queer-centered public gathering. And finally, High T.E.A. was established “to create siblinghood amid transgender/gender-nonconforming folx of color and their allies.” It provides a space for empowering participants to be the narrators and arbitrators of their own stories.

“We want to ensure that everyone feels not only safe and seen, but that they feel brave by being a part of our programs,” Anderson emphasizes. “The only way that can be done is to really be there intentionally for their well-being. We want people to feel welcome and know that we are committed to their care.” Recently, Anderson curated a retreat that dealt with aging and HIV.   

At a recent retreat for P.L.U.S. United, participants shared comments through anonymous surveys. Anderson shares a few of those comments from three attendees:

“I was terrified to come here. I’ve been positive for 16 years and never really stepped in or leaned into my status. I don’t discuss it. Coming here made it okay to explore the spaces that intersect my status with people of the same life experience. That meant more than I could ever have imagined. It was everything I didn’t know I needed. It was truly, ‘You had to be there.’”

“Living with HIV for over a decade, I’ve participated in other groups. There is none like P.L.U.S. United. I feel safe to share in this group. I feel like I’m in a brotherhood. The things I learn to cope with my diagnosis aren’t offered anywhere else. After each outing or meeting, I feel joy. I feel like I’m not alone, and that helps me to keep living and wanting to achieve anything.”

“My diagnosis came at me hard. I was put in spaces that showed me that I am not alone and that if I wanted to embrace all aspects of my identity, I could. P.L.U.S. helps me give myself permission to be my authentic self. I am not there yet, but I want to get to the point where I can share my story objectively so that others can understand that they are not alone. I have established connections that will be cultivated in a long-lasting fellowship. I won’t ever sell myself short again, because we are able to pour into one another.”

Anderson has mentored 26-year-old Phillip Burton for the past year. “He is just so kind,” Burton says about Anderson. “He’s always there for me and gives me sage advice. That has been so important to me as a gay Black man. He shows me that it’s possible to live an enriching life and help other people. Everyone around him loves him. He’s such a great dude.”

Burton, a spoken-word artist, met Anderson at one of the heART&SOUL open mics. “It is such a safe zone for people who want to tell their stories but can’t really find another place to do it. Representation is so important, because I didn’t think about what my future would look like until I met Kevin. Now I can see that we can lead prosperous and successful lives.”   

Josie Pickens works closely with Anderson and the T.R.U.T.H Project in a contractor role. She first became aware of the Project by attending a session of heART&SOUL years ago, and then going to other Project events and fundraisers. “As a Black queer woman, I had never seen anything like those open mics,” she says. “Kevin is such a visionary. He can weave together art, creativity, and activism, and he is a rare find.” Pickens admires Anderson’s intentionality, and the fact that he walks his talk.

One of Pickens’ recently organized events was “Brunch with Baldwin,” honoring the late Black queer author James Baldwin. “He wasn’t really valued and respected in ways that he should have been. How did he even survive, let alone keep going?”

Pickens organizes an annual Rest Fest. “It helps folks focus on the importance of rest and self care, particularly in this new political climate,” she says. She also works with community advisory boards that help the Project hear the voices of those impacted by their programs. “Especially now, when we know that there will be even fewer resources available, we need to create spaces of hope.”

And We Rest on Giants

In 2023, the Project released a 16-minute documentary titled And We Rest on Giants. The film has been screened nearly 50 times, including at 15 film festivals, where it has won three festival awards. The film features five people of color—an AIDS doctor and four HIV-positive people who are aging and thriving. The film’s opening sequence features spoken-word artist James Just.

Anderson says, “The purpose of the film is to give people hope, to remind them that they are not alone, and to show them that they are not what they’ve been told they are.”

Dr. Bethsheba Johnson, a community ally, was the AIDS doctor in the film. “I cry every time I see it, listening to the people that were speaking, and it just moves me so,” she says. Johnson began working with AIDS patients in 1988 at Rush Hospital in Chicago. “I was on a dedicated floor for people living with HIV. Staff members would just shove food trays into their rooms. Things were horrible, and patients were so isolated.”

Johnson now lives just outside Houston in Pearland. Years ago, she was putting together a panel about HIV and needed someone living with HIV on the panel. She asked Anderson if he knew someone, and he said he would be on the panel. Johnson had no idea of Anderson’s status until then.

Johnson remembers the day that her interview for the film was made. “I had just listened to Dena Gray-Hughes tell her story, and I had been crying. But Kevin had excellent questions and made me feel like it was just me and him talking.” 

Every year on her birthday, Johnson asks Facebook friends to donate to the T.R.U.T.H. Project instead of giving her gifts. In addition, she attends the majority of Anderson’s fundraisers.

Jay Clark, the co-producer of the film, met Anderson years ago when they made a film titled Black Boy Symphony. “We immediately had great chemistry working with each other,” says Clark. “Kevin has an energy that I really like being around. When he first approached me about producing Giants, I knew it would be something uplifting, inspirational, and impactful.”

Clark’s partner of 14 years, Frank Hernandez, is the other co-producer of the film. It took about a year to plan, shoot, and edit the documentary. They are both pleased that the film has been so well received. At the film’s premiere, it was immediately obvious that it was an audience hit.

Anderson reveals that two more Project films are now in production. One features Dena Gray-Hughes, the 2016 Houston Ally Pride Marshal, and her husband. The other focuses on Black gay men living with HIV in the South. Anderson is excited that there will be three documented spaces where the HIV narrative is being told. “Not just told,” he says, “but celebrated for the lives and not the disease.” 

Looking Back, Forging Ahead

Having just turned 50, Anderson says he has become more reflective. For so many years, he has implemented ideas that just seemed natural for him to create—safe spaces where people’s sense of isolation has been lessened. Now he has begun to see them all as part of his personal journey.

Looking back, Anderson wishes there had been programs for him at an earlier age like the programs he has been developing and nurturing for decades. “Especially regarding my queerness. And when I was diagnosed with HIV. I’ve had my own battles with mental health,” he adds.      

“To me, it’s been revolutionary to go against what society has done to a community—to go up against the norm of making people feel ‘less than’ and invite affected people to be in a space of healing. I’m happy to be a part of that. Marginalization doesn’t come from nowhere; it exists for a reason, and it’s because of oppression. Now it all begins to align.”

In June 2024, Anderson was honored by the local LGBTQ community by being named the Male Identifying Pride Marshal. He is married and has been in a relationship for 17 years with his husband, Roderick Coleman. They are raising two daughters.

Reflecting on the current political landscape, Anderson says that on Inauguration Day he chose to watch a documentary about civil-rights legend Rosa Parks rather than listen to a vitriolic inauguration speech that previewed the profound challenges we will be facing during the next four years and beyond.   

For more info, visit truthprojecthtx.org.