Thanks so much for your interest in the Visibility Project. Stoked to work, engage, and build community. We are hosting two days of story gathering in Chicago! Saturday will be hosted at the Uptown offices of Asian Americans Advancing Justice Chicago and Sunday will be hosted at the Lakeview home of an allied community member. Both are close to public transportation, have some street parking, and are wheelchair accessible. Below are some FAQs about participating. Please don’t hesitate to contact us with any questions. 

Click to register and share your story.

Mia Nakano 
Director, Visibility Project 
mia@visibilityproject.org 

ELIGIBILITY 
This project is open to Queer Asian American Women, Gender non-conforming, and Trans people, and the definitions of this are broad: mixed-race asian, asian born/living in the US, south asian, southeast asian, pacific islanders, etc. If you are a gay/bi asian american cis male, or queer person of non Asian/Asian American descent, support by allyship, giving shout outs on social media, or whatever ways you’re excited about support. 

WHAT TO EXPECT

The shoots take 1 hour and are a combination of photography and video. We’ll do the video first and I’ll leave time at the beginning to answer any questions. You’ll fill out a survey + model release prior to starting.

WHAT TO WEAR

Wear colors and no logos, unless you really wanna rep that logo. A lot of folks have historically worn black, white, or grey, I’m trying to spice up the colors. BUT! If black/white/grey is what floats your boat, go for it.

HOW WILL THE PHOTOS & VIDEOS BE USED

All content will be posted on the Visibility Project website, the VP social media outlets (twitter, tumblr, facebook, etc) and open to publication in a soon to be published photo-book. The Videos will ultimately be transcribed into english, so text is searchable online, and translated into an Asian language from participant backgrounds. Basically this means that these stories will have an international reach! The Videos will also be “locked down” so that no website outside of the VP or Hyphen magazine can embed or download them. We cannot guarantee the unlicensed distribution of the photos, just because the internets is hard to control.

HYPHEN MAGAZINE

The midwest & southern tours are a collaboration between the VP and Hyphen magazine. Nakano is a founder of Hyphen and the creator of Hyphen’s LGBTQ section. Your story may be shared on Hyphen’s website and social media, which has a huge national reach in the mainstream AAPI community. 

DO I GET THE PHOTOS & VIDEOS

You will get low resolution images of 3 images from the shoot. You’ll receive the images in 6-8 weeks. You are free to use them for facebook + social media + bio pics + etc, credit must be given to Mia Nakano Photography & The Visibility Project. 

The videos are very backlogged, by a three years. Just to be real about that. When they are finished, you’ll have 1 week to review the final video and request edits/content removal. They will be uploaded to a password protected space during that review time. You may also choose to not have your video published, and instead have your story shared anonymously through a full or partial written transcription. 

MODEL RELEASE

All participants must sign a “catch all” model release. However if you ever want to be removed from the project website, we are happy to accommodate that. Printed materials or final video productions already in distribution cannot be retracted.

CONFIRMATIONS & CANCELLATIONS

We work with registered participants on a first come first serve basis, if you find you can’t make your session let us know asap so other folks may participate!  Also register with an email address you check frequently, because more information will be sent to confirmed participants.

The Visibility Project is fiscally sponsored by Asian Americans for Civil Rights and Equality (AACRE). Funded by the Creative Work Fund, Red Envelope Giving Circle, generous individual donors, and community supporters!