1. Take A PORTRAIT OF YOU
2. I GIVE YOU A PRINT
3. Do Whatever you want to it
4. I Rephotograph IT

— Gary Heery

His endeavour for Project X was to offer something curious: a collaboration between the photographer and the subject. The intimate moment of sitting in a chair in front of his experienced lens is followed by the private opportunity to add to that image. To interrogate it. To paint it. To submerge it in the ocean or perhaps anoint it with a little human blood.

Some people sliced into the sacred skin of “big portrait” Others used it as craft. The opportunity for graffiti was ripe. And for many this must have simply felt like liberation. To edit themselves. To laugh a little bit at the pressure of appearances. There is nothing as radical as the gravity of the photograph being allowed to fail. So, here is a collection less about the best shot and more engrained in the moment, stained by the personal obsessions of each individual. Here is the social image as both relic and conversation. It’s just that bit more alive.

— Anna Johnson