This AIDS Awareness Month, we remember Gia Carangi, the late 1970s supermodel who was a favorite of photographers like Francesco Scavullo and Chris von Wangenheim, and whose short but powerful career has been well-documented over the years – including HBO’s 1998 biographical film Gia in which the model was portrayed by Angelina Jolie.

Gia, who was from Philadelphia, became a symbol for a new type of model that played to the mood of the era – dark, edgy, sultry, as in the exact opposite of the sunny, playful, all-American spirit that until that point the norm in American editorials. For the most part, she was considered a print model though she did walk the runway for Perry Ellis.

When Gia died on November 18, 1986, she became one of the first well-known women to die of AIDS. Gia is not forgotten.