Meaningful Encounters 2008

Meaningful Encounters actively engaged participants of an outreach programme with mental health service users to create collaborative portraits. Within the series of portraits all narrative and pictorial decisions were made in collaboration with the subject, including the location, dress, camera set up, pose and via the aid of a cable release, the moment the images were exposed.

The work challenges traditional means of creating photographic portraiture, by offering a playful experience in which to discover new identities.  Aiming to offer sitters greater control of their self-image and ask the viewer to question how mental health is perceived.