The Chain Letter Project (Vol. 1) was first presented as an extension of Kha’s 2023 solo exhibtion in Baxter St’s Project Space. The Chain Letter Project is a collective memory contributed to by AAPI friends from across the United States over the last year. This first iteration of the project comprises around 700 photographs. The second iteration is co-authored by the teachers, faculty, and students of Philips Academy.
Dear ____________,
Thank you for participating in this art chain letter project! Through the Addison Gallery, I am collecting images along the themes of “family” and “community.” We are accepting pictures from smartphones, point and shoot cameras, DSLR, any picture medium that follows the prompts below. A limited disposable cameras will be distributed from designated support, feel free to pass around the camera (be sure to return it!).
All images will be printed and will be installed as a photo’ collage wall, being added on to over the exhibition period.
You can make a picture of 1) whatever you choose in the theme of “community” and “collage” and/or 2) you can choose one of the following prompts.
1. Gather and arrange a community of red objects and photograph it.
2. How do you make a portrait of a person without photographing them? How would you make a non-portrait portrait?
3. Make a group portrait, can you be in it too?
4. Photograph your favorite door in your local area.
5. Find a familiar place with a large mirror. Make a selfie with another person showing the camera in the mirror.
6. Create a mask, document the process of making the mask. Have a family member wear it.
7. Photograph your favorite sign near your home/community.
8. Photograph your favorite item with someone you trust holding it.
9. Photograph a graffiti, a mural, or chalk drawing.
10. Make a picture of an eyeball, real or fictive.
11. Photograph an obsession. – prompt from Richard Choi
12. Photograph an interaction. – prompt from Marie Arago
13. Photograph food pictures—specifically restaurant pictures and grocery shopping. – prompt from Alison Kuo
14. Photograph a storefront (that is colorful). – prompt from Alison Kuo
15. More abstractly, photograph something you wouldn’t want to part with. – prompt from Alison Kuo
16. Find and photograph a place that shares letters in your name (first or last).
17. Make and photograph a shrine/a memorial dedicated to a real person.
18. Make a picture with your friends navigating your way in a new place.
19. Make a picture from behind you (without looking through the viewfinder) while waiting in line with people.
20. Use the flash on a reflective surface at a friend’s room.
21. Make a picture of your favorite window of a neighbor.
22. Make a picture of your parents’ collection.
23. Make a picture where you would tell a secret to a friend.
24. Restage a friend’s family picture from their memory.
25. Photograph a neighbor’s favorite source of water/or a body of water.
26. Make a picture of a “collage.”
27. Make a self-portrait sharing that the frame.
Please note, this list is subject to change and expand.
- TK, Updated 2025.