Lisa Havilah, the enigmatic director of Sydney arts centre Carriageworks, should be applauded for her vision. Not only has she made, in what is essentially a short time, the abandoned rail sheds in the once-dodgy part of the city a thriving hub for live performance and visual art, but created alliances with commercial organisations that both support Carriageworks and engage in a dialogue about contemporary culture and Sydney life more broadly. That’s certainly the case with Carriageworks’ ongoing collaboration with property group BresicWhitney which, following a photographic project with Samuel Hodge earlier this year, now presents a new series of portraits titled The Things I Love.

Sydney photographer Daniel Boud was commissioned to shoot local residents with, as the title suggests, the things they hold dear. The resultant images tell a story about each of the subjects and demonstrate the intimate nature of a collection, whether of contemporary art, traditional Chinese scrolls, vintage kimonos or books, as in some of the portraits featured. Those featured include Abdul Abdullah (artist), William Yang (artist), Penelope Seidler (architect), Deborah Sams and Mary Lou Ryan (of Bassike), Kylie Kwong (chef), Will Edwards (of Archie Rose), Elizabeth Tillman (of TEES), Rarriwuy Hick (actor), Louise Zhang (artist) and Julian Day (artist and journalist).

Accompanying the portrait series is an Instagram competition open to the public, which invites people, over a four-week period, to share their own unique collection on the visual social media platform to in the draw to win a ten-year Carriageworks membership and an original print by Mr Boyd. As Ms Havilah explains: “Daniel’s works capture intimate personal stories relating to the art of collecting, including stylistically and culturally diverse collections that we hope will inspire wider audiences on social media to share their own collection.” The competition closes 07 December 2015.