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Stand Up To Cancer campaign uses photos of real people to portray ‘raw reality’

Photographs in which cancer patients show their scars appear in a project to raise funds
Picture shows a woman naked from the waist up, with a scar where one breast has been removed. People with cancer are allowing pictures of themselves displaying the scars from their treatment to be used in the fundraising Defiance project.

Photographs in which cancer patients show their scars appear in a ‘reality’ Stand Up To Cancer fundraising and awareness campaign

Picture shows a man naked from the waist up, with a scar where one breast has been removed. People with cancer are allowing pictures of themselves displaying the scars from their treatment to be used in the fundraising Defiance project.
Picture: PA Wire

People with cancer are allowing pictures of themselves displaying the scars from their treatment to be used in a project that aims to portray the ‘raw reality’ of the disease.

In total, 16 men and women diagnosed with cancer took part in the Defiance photoshoot to show strength and solidarity against the disease, despite the changes to their bodies.

‘We aren’t playing to cancer’s rules’

The Defiance project photos have been released as part of Stand Up To Cancer, a joint fundraising campaign by Cancer Research UK and Channel 4, which aims to look at cancer in an honest and unfiltered way.

Picture shows a woman naked from the waist up, with a scar where one breast has been removed. People with cancer are allowing pictures of themselves displaying the scars from their treatment to be used in the fundraising Defiance project.
Picture: PA Wire

Photographer Ami Barwell, who took the pictures, called the project an act of rebellion. She said: ‘Cancer isn’t pretty – it can be dark, painful and destructive. But we aren’t playing to cancer’s rules. These people are strong, beautiful and, most of all, defiant.’

Among those featured is Deborah James from London, who has bowel cancer and uses the name @bowelbabe on social media. ‘I’m living with stage 4 cancer, but you wouldn’t know it if you saw me walking down the street,’ she said.

‘It’s about not being defined by my cancer. I want to be seen as the woman I was before and yes, sometimes I do still want to look sexy. Doing this shoot for Stand Up To Cancer has been so empowering.’

Stand Up To Cancer funds cancer research and has raised more than £62 million to date to support 52 clinical trials and projects.


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