Mobile Artists on Their Artistry – Interview with Artist Jane Schultz

I see music and create without rules. As such, my work is diverse in the sense that it encompasses darker portraits, colourful ICMs and collages, and nature pieces. It spans  from from an expressionist exploration of emotional depths to an impressionist exploration of movement based photography  resulting in imagery that takes place in space and time. It is all documented and explored in iOS based photographic images.  My goal is not to create a gallery where everything looks very similar but to create art that is inspiring to me at the moment, while pushing my boundaries. To me, this is much more interesting.

Creating is not the end of my involvement in the mobile art community. My work has been recognized in numerous art competitions and exhibited internationally. I also administer Edit from the Soul and @ig_artistry, Facebook and Instagram sites which promote originality, creativity, and emotive art, curate for the New Era Museum, judge and juror photographic competitions, and teach mobile photography and artistry. It is a world of mobile art.

Ahhh. My usernames most definitely express the work published thereunder. I started out with one account on Instagram under the name @phot0bug. As my work became more art oriented, I realised that username was no longer self descriptive. As time evolved, I started publishing in three galleries with three user names which come from very beautiful and poignant lyrics by the band Marillion. This ties intimately to the works as lyrics are often integral to my images, being the finishing touches and part of the titles to most of my images. @before.1st.light, from Afraid of Sunlight, comes from the lyric “Small boats, on the beach at the dead of night, come and go, before first light” which was representative of Instagram to me as it exploded in size and the small world and intimate relationships created there began to vaporize. The album of the same title relates to the destructive nature frame and asks how we have become afraid of sunlight, the essence of our lives, and as such became the home for my darker expressionist work which brought my first acclaim. @after.1st.illumination, a play on the @before.1st.light username, came to be after a collaboration with an artist from Berlin who pushed me hard and in new directions creatively. #ixifamily It contains bursts of color and playfulness. Lastly, @the.sky.above.the.rain comes from a song of the same title. The song is a love song about a couple with an impaired relationship struggling to find each other again, whose hope is to “Rise up to that blue space above the clouds, where troubles die”. Life is tough for us all, in different ways, and art can take us to new and better places. I wanted to give the viewer that blue space through the beauty of nature, and that’s primarily what can be found here.

Loving and supportive with some broken parts, and with elements that pass from generation to generation.

Not in a way that I can identify but our childhoods form us, so it must have.

Sadly, my Mom had passed by the time I truly started creating. I expect that she would have been very proud.

It has been a process. Somewhere in the 2012-14 timeframe, I’d look at the works of some of the more respected members of the mobile art world and say to myself, “I want to do that. Not to copy what they were doing but to create work that engendered their respect.” They influenced my ideas about creativity, expressing it in my work, staying true to mobile, working and using my own work as opposed to stock. A turning point came to be in 2014, when I met and spent time with a few members of our community at my first physical exhibition. They viewed me as an artist, before I did myself. It is only recently that I am truly comfortable with that title.

Breaking the mold, expression, coming from your own mind and soul, a gentle explosion that comes from opening the mind and letting it come out –  resulting in a tangible or digital formation.

I was a lawyer, the VP intellectual property at a high tech corporation. My responsibilities included transactions with multinational telecommunication device manufacturers, like Apple and Samsung. I did a lot of IP licensing, purchases and sales.

At home with a good block of time to let the wave take hold.

You do. Also, recently, Agnès Clairand and Angela Chalmers make my heart sing.

Not the engagement per se but it can push me to start new projects and art that I view can inspire me, as well.

That’s a tough question as my days can be quite different. One commonality is that they typically start with a large cup of latte with my husband and end with a TV show together on our couch. In between, my days encompass ordinary things like taking walks and running errands. They are best when they include friends, nature, and of course creating art.

It’s my intention to create and express, sometimes with a theme in mind. I think this often results in a little of both.

My @after.1st.illumination has some work with a humorous spirit.

I don’t view things in my life as a failure and I’m not really sure how one can fail at art. I also don’t view failure as the opposite of success as living life itself is often a process and creating art can involve experimentation. For example, sometimes, no matter how hard I work on and image and no matter how much I liked my initial concept, I don’t like the results. Is this failure? Always remember the Mary Pickford quote, “‘Failure’ is not the falling down, but the staying down”. If it made me quit mobile editing, then it might well be. Instead I forget about it and move on. As to that image, I put it away to give it space and may come back to it later. Often, it clicks and I can finish it quickly in a way that I’m really satisfied with. If it doesn’t, I move on again.

As well as anyone 😆 It depends on the spirit and intention it is given with. I welcome constructive good intentioned advice but have no time for people with ill will or pettiness in their hearts.

It’s given me more quiet introspection. I’ve found my art has migrated to a more organic state.

You, Vincent, and so many of the wonderful people in our mobile art community. I’d also life to talk with some of my ancestors and ask them the things I wish I did  while they were alive.

There are so many.

-If you have your health, you have everything.

-Get over it.

-Don’t spend what you don’t have.

-If you don’t ask, you don’t get.

-(when entertaining) You can never have too much food.

-Be yourself. Stand up and be beautiful you!

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