TheAppWhisperer

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr/Instagram Group Showcase – 22 March 2020

2020-03-22 by Joanne Carter

22 March 2020, Mother’s Day, England, “fear educates our care for each other – we fear a sick person might be made sicker, or that a person’s life might be made even more miserable and we do whatever we can to protect them because we have a fear a version of human life in which everyone lives only for themselves. I am not the least bit afraidd of this fear, for fear is a vital and necessary part of life“, observed poet Anne Boyer. This week, like many of us, I’ve immersed myself in art, both written and visual. I found myself, once more, drawn to Bleak House by Charles Dickens, throughout the novel many illnesses are depicted, none more so, or more profound than smallpox. Dickens demonstrated an exceptional grasp of disease, he demonstrated the unique ability to offer fear as a motivator, in order to convince people to change their ways of living. In the novel one of the characters contracts the disease in a graveyard and passes it on to two others, one who nearly dies and the other who is scarred for life. But it was clear that avoidance of graveyards was not enough to prevent the spread of this disease. Other factors played a part, miasma – bad air – or poisonous gas from rotting organic matter was suspected. However, what was very clear was the disease spread from person to person. Self-imposed quarantine became a theme of two of the characters, “keep her out, Charley, if you love me truly, to the last! Charley, if you let her in but once, only to look upon me for one moment, as I lie here, I shall die“. Quarantine is emphasised repeatedly during the characters illness, to which she refers to it as ‘contagion’. There’s a juxtaposition between art and medicine throughout the book, this is deliberate, Dickens knew that the art we create offers far more than respite, it is a tool enabling us to physically and mentally gain perspective not only in troubling times but throughout our lives. Stay safe and love your mothers from afar today.

Thank you to all the talented artists for submitting your works to our showcase this week. If you would like your work to be considered for entry in to our weekly Mobile Photography and Art Flickr Group, please submit it to our dedicated group, here. You can also submit images to our Instagram tag for this section #mobilephotographyandimagery.

Michael Beresin, Vadim Demjianov, Jun Yamaguchi, Susan Maxwell Schmidt, Jill Lian, Kat McClelland, Lorenka Campos, Lindy Ginn, Oola Cristina, Meri Walker – @TheiPhoneArtGirl, Cathrine Halsor, Susan Detroy, Catherine Caddigan, Gianluca Ricoveri, Tomaso Belloni, Peter Wilkin, Judy Wahlberg, Jennifer Bracewell, Jane Schultz, p.a. hamel, Clint Cline, Susan Rennie, Deborah McMillion, soul_engine, Susan Latty – @pause.and.breathe, @aquamirena, @rejanerubin, Dina Alfasi, @iphonefineartphotography, Deborah Morbeto, Jean Hutter, Guido Colla – effe5, le_brab – Pascal, Jenny Pieters – jenivoigt, ja_graham, wphotonick, Eliza Badoiu, Lee Atwell, klimtt – M. Cecilia Sao Thiago.

Music this week is ‘Breath of Life’ by Florence and the Machine

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr/Instagram Group Showcase – 4 August 2019

2019-08-042019-08-04 by Joanne Carter

Sleepy, exhilarated and refreshed, having spent time with talented mobile artist and dear friend, Linda Toki from the United States in Kew Gardens yesterday. What joy! To me, there’s nothing quite like ‘sealing the deal‘ of a ‘social media‘ friendship, with meeting in person. Our intellectual circles overlap, our mutual interests conincide and our views of the world chime together. Supple, incisive with infectious warmth and humour, what a gift of intuitive turns and juxtapositions yesterday turned out to be. My body felt so stuffed with good luck, I almost woke up this morning choking on it. My advice, to anyone who doubts the relevance of true online friendship, is stay open because life only gets richer as it unfolds.

This weeks searing showcase of kaleidoscopic mobile photography and art is a masterclass in tempo, tone and character. Apoplexy ebbs to stunned disbelief, as you contemplate each one of these images has been created from artists throughout the world on their mobile phones. Enjoy!

Meri Walker, Rita Colantonio, Vadim Demjianov, Jun Yamaguchi, Fleur Schim, Karen Axelrad, Kat McClelland, Paul Toussaint, Hanni K, woltarise, Jeremy Cassell, Russ Merz, Linda Hollier, Susan Blase, Klaudi Cechini, Kathy Clay, jillian2 – Jill Lian, Yasuo Furue, Peter Wilkin, Barbara Braman, aka Tman, Catherine Caddigan, Rob Pearson-Wright, Susan Maxwell Schmidt, Marina Sergeevna, Gianluca Ricoveri, Judy Wahlberg, before.1st.night – Jane Schultz, David DeNagel, Susan Maxwell Schmidt, Susan Rennie, Clint Cline, Dina Alfasi, titika.vision, rain.is.poetry – Paul Suciu, j.a.graham, theartofmayte, effe5, Sandra B Martins, Anca Balja, Edith Meier, mazetman, reneviolence – Rene Valencia, Diane Neubauer, Nicole Christophe, rklika, Fiona Christian, Eliza Badoiu.

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr/Instagram Group Showcase – 19 May 2019

2019-05-192019-05-19 by Joanne Carter

“Few travelled in these days, for, thanks to the advance of science, the earth was exactly alike all over. Rapid intercourse, from which the previous civilization had hoped so much, had ended by defeating itself. What was the good of going to Peking when it was just like Shrewsbury? Why return to Shrewsbury when it would all be like Peking? Men seldom moved their bodies; all unrest was concentrated in the soul.” ―E.M. Forster, The Machine Stops and the first book that I immediately reread thrice, when I was thirteen. It was the first book that interrupted my thought processes enough to relieve me of outside pressures. It was transient, like a mediation. Today, several new books have been released along an albeit more modern but similar vein. I am thinking of Frankisstein by Jeanette Winterson, author of Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit. As well as Ian McEwan’s ‘Machines Like Me’ new release, set in 1982. This counterfactual novel sees Argentinian end the war abruptly with the Falklands becoming Las Malvinas. McEwan introduces an £86k male robot designed by Alan Turing, who in this book, has not been hounded to death for his homosexuality but instead, lauded for his technological breakthroughs. Of course it’s speculative fiction but the complexity is as disturbing as it is intelligent.

During an interview with Lisa Allardice for The Guardian, in a smart London restaurant last week, Winterson concedes, (in response to the Allardice’s statement that creating this novel (Frankisstein) would have taken her down some unlikely digital paths).“I did worry about that. Watching guys have sex with bots, female sex dolls start at around $2,000 for a really crap one”, she said, and it was no surprise to learn that they are “entirely fantasy. They’ve got huge tits and small waists and long legs, but of course what they haven’t got, and never will have, is a clitoris. They don’t have to worry about that!”

It’s interesting to me how the current crop of writing that is very much in vogue is AI based, much like mobile photography and art. Both arts mirror the trends. While the Machine Stops, represented a sci fi fantasy and immense treasured escape from my living reality, now at 50, Winterson and McEwan, along with the AI of smartphone visualisation represent, our new reality, and are the forces driving the process. Today, this mutual cultural presence is the next revolution, it is not just present within photography, it is reaching all arts. In 2015 Taylor Davidson, for Time magazine, described the camera of the future as an app, “a software rather than a device that compiles data from multiple sensors. The smartphone’s microphone, gyroscope, accelerometer, thermometer and other sensors all contribute data as needed by whatever app calls on it and combines it with the visual data”. Stephen Mayes, went on to contribute “and still that’s not the limit on what is already bundled with our digital imagery. Our instruments are connected to satellites that contribute GPS data while connecting us to the Internet that links our data to all the publicly available information of Wikipedia, Google and countless other resources that know where we are, who was there before us and the associated economic, social and political activity”.

This is the life we now live, we need to ensure we flesh out, some of the moral dilemmas within the drama of everyday life and remember what makes us human. We need no one to write us an algorithm for how to treat others and how to live well, although some humans, may be all the better for it.

Poetic Medium, Jun Yamaguchi, David DeNagel, Caren Drysdale, Deborah McMillion, Art Noonan, Lydia Cassatt, Laila, Karen Axelrad, Eduardo Llerandi, jilllian2 – Jill Lian, Chris Montcalmo, Vladislav Niko, Paul Toussaint, Nick Kenrick, Rita Colantonio, Vadim Demjianov, Allyson Marie, before.1st.light – Jane Schultz, borsbschulz2009, Kat McClelland, Susan Detroy, Amo Passicos, Kerry Mitchell, Will Reyes, Susan Rennie, Gianluca Ricoveri, Kate Zari Roberts, Debara Splendorio, Ralf Mauvog, Peter Wilkin, Rob Pearson-Wright, Clint Cline, TheiPhoneArtGirl – Meri Walker, Rita Colantonio, Catherine Caddigan, p.a.hamel, Jormain Cady.

Music this week is ‘As the Mist Clears’©Salt of the Sound

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr/Instagram Group Showcase – 12 May 2019

2019-05-132019-05-12 by Joanne Carter

My daughter’s school prom this week manifested into the creation of a taut, magnificently controlled week, with smidgen’s, in my case, of personal survival. The entire week was one of lucid reflection as the period of her school days came to an end with an almost surrealist picture of her leavers celebration. The limpid clarity as an observer and witness to the life changes as she transgresses can only be compared to Claude Cahun’s photomontages, it looks like life, but it’s not life, exactly. Only art can achieve this degree of realism.

I end this week, with a juddering heart, strangely close to tears, knowing that the true emotional nature of this week, gloriously ramps up next week, as her exams commence…

Take heart, view this weeks mobile photography and art lancing showcase, as more and more mobile photographers and artists find us, we are privileged to share their work.

Louise Whiting, Pascale G, Debbie Sutherland, G Billion, Poetic Medium, Kat McClelland, Jun Yamaguchi, Deborah McMillion, Clint Cline, Paul Yan, Arko Rayhan, Prodromos, Vako Darispanashvili, Laila, Peter Wilkin, klimtt – cecilia Sao Thiago, woltarise, Rita Colantonio, Andreas Komodromos, Clare Pickett, Ian Horne, Vadim Demjianov, Tomaso Belloni, Kerry Mitchell, Montse Abad, Kristin, Nick Kenrick, Amo Passicos, Eduardo Llerandi, before.1st.light – Jane Schultz, Catherine Caddigan, Linda Hollier, Lorenka Campos, Barbara Braman, Sarah Kuhn, Judy Wahlberg, Lake MacIntosh, Anthony Madigan, p.a. hamel, TheiPhoneArtGirl – Meri Walker, Charlaleeo, Robin Robertis, Tuba Korhan, Karen Axelrad.

Music this week is ‘You’re own kind of Beautiful’ by Alih-Jey Depena

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr/Instagram Group Showcase – 5 May 2019

2019-05-052019-05-05 by Joanne Carter

“Whenever the world throws rose petals at you, which thrill and seduce the ego, beware” Anne Lamott. I was told a similar thing, not quite so poetically, when I was promoted and became the technical editor of a print camera magazine, many years ago… it’s long gone. “Many congratulations Joanne, but keep those feet on the ground“, cautioned the main editor of the title. Sound advice, but doesn’t it get a little boring sometimes? For years now, I’ve noticed that I have become more and more sensible and it’s getting frustrating. I’m organised, at least in my mind, it might not show physically in my office. I keep my children’s diaries, as well as my own ticking over, day by day. I attend fabulous five star art events, around the world, I attend school meetings with senior teachers, I view the most breathtaking art – on a daily basis, I share my life with the richest most eloquent artists I’ve ever had the good fortune to befriend, I read and respond to specialist medical reports, I attend countless hospital appointments and physical examinations monthly and each time, return home, to remain forever sensible and organised. Even my car, is so understated that it only occurred to me recently, why it was that every single time I look into my rear view mirror on the motorway, that there seems to be a horizontal row of traffic a good 100 yards behind me, the reason being, the British public appear to believe this is an undercover police car and I’m about to turn on my hidden blue lights to anyone who overtakes me. It’s actually quite useful, I can get to destinations much quicker and my car remains untouched when unattended (unusual for around here).

To desire is as good as to possess and I think, I’ll just keep being judicious a little longer, at least until I can fully reveal what I’m working on, after that, I can assure you, my feet won’t touch the ground, yours won’t either and the only blue lights we’ll see, will be the ones at the celebratory party!

Oola Cristina, Chris Feichtner, Paul Yan, Jun Yamaguchi, Clint Cline, Lydia Cassatt, Robin Robertis, Allyson Marie, Karen Axelrad, Catherine Caddigan, Jennifer Bracewell, borisbschulz, Poetic Medium, jilllian2 – Jill Lian, Yasuo Furue, Tracey Grumbach, Rita Colantonio, Kristie Michele Art – Kristie Benoit, Joseph Cyr, Kat McClelland, Lawrence Lazare, Damian De Souza, before.1st.light – Jane Schultz, Susan Blase, jon jon, Kate Zari Roberts, Susan Rennie, Judy Wahlberg, Rob Pearson-Wright, TheiPhoneArtGirl – Meri Walker, p.a. hamel, Michael Brunsfeld, Lorenka Campos, Candice Railton, Gianluca Ricoveri.

Music this week is ‘Anchor’ ©Stephanie Schneiderman

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr/Instagram Group Showcase – 28 April 2019

2019-04-282019-04-28 by Joanne Carter

“If you’re paying attention and making your own life as beautiful and rich and fun as it can be, you might just attract someone who’s doing the same thing, you can give up on tracking someone down with your butterfly net.” Words by Anne Lamott, who married this week at Deer Park Villa, in Fairfax, California. She met her husband through a dating site, called OurTime, a matchmaking site for the over 50’s. She had been single for a long period and felt absolutely no wanton feelings to change that. When asked, by the New York Times writer, Lois Smith Brady, 26th April 2019, why she stayed single so long, she replied that she was shy and introverted and hated leaving the house, particularly for parties.“If I go to a party, I become a Roz Chast character with my arms hanging at my sides and I feel like I’m developing a tic,”. Lamott has has published 18 memoirs and novels, many about being a recovering alcoholic, single mother, perpetual worrier and late-in-life churchgoer. I’ve read many of her books, you knew that was coming, right? I read incessantly, there’s only one thing that frustrates me about reading and that is that I can’t write and view images at the same time. I’m good at multi-tasking but not at that. Perhaps, it’s a learning difficulty, yesterday morning I spent many hours supporting one of my children as they undertook an updated private disability assessment with an acclaimed consultant, to enable them to successfully progress onto the next stage of their life. Feeling emotionally, mentally and physically drained post test, we both later collapsed at home, for a while. Disability diagnoses, if necessary, are crucially important when navigating this world. So many obstacles appear very quickly insurmountable without the correct support and often are but with it, you can fly.

What I love about Lamott, is she is a fighter, as I am, as my family are, we are a strong and very healthy, positive, loving unit, that’s not to say, life is easy because it is not but we try to focus on the things that really matter, whilst simultaneously fighting to keep the wolves from the door. Smith Brady, closed her article in the New York Times describing Lamott as ,’A natural cheerleader, especially for underdogs’. Lamott later posted on her Facebook page, “never give up, no matter how things look or how long they take. Don’t quit before the miracle.” And so, I say to all of you incredibly talented mobile photographers and artists out there, I can reveal, very candidly that there is a miracle opening here and I am going to ensure you’re all cordially invited to be part of it, it is coming and I am very excited. Stand by me, there is ecstasy in paying attention.

Paul Yan, Hanna Martins, Anastasia Potekhina, Jun Yamaguchi, Cathrine Halsor, borisbschulz2009, Debara Splendorio, Tricia Dewey, Sherrianne100, Laila, qingxian guo, Eduardo Llerandi, Michael Brunsfeld, Fiona Keyes, Scott Simpson, Kat McClelland, Erika Brothers, F4810P, Susan Detroy, Enio Godoy, Rita Colantonio, Lorenka Campos, Emma Dauvin, Lawrence Lazare, Peter Wilkin, Nick Kenrick, Kathy Clay, Milly M, Tomaso Belloni, Arko Rayhan, Anthony Madigan, jillian2 – Jill Lian, Gianluca Ricoveri, Tuba, Kate Zari Roberts, p.a.hamel, lifequest22, Ioannis Sidirpoulos.

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr/Instagram Group Showcase – 7 April 20019

2019-04-072019-04-07 by Joanne Carter

After scoring a hat trick, I am back! As some of you will have noticed, I was off last week. Not one to take life easy, I managed to cram it with, Mother’s Day, my 50th birthday and a serious lung infection. An accomplishment even by my own standards. The lung infection leading the way, I spent my days and continue to do so, (desperately trying to avoid another hospital admission), dosing up with antibiotics, sleeping sitting upright (it can be done, I’ve learnt, once complete exhaustion sets in) and reading a wide variety of books. I got it down to two books every two days, a record for me. This is all in sharp contrast to the preceding two weeks where I, at least felt like, flew around Amsterdam and swanned around Paris, with a scrum of journalists in close contact throughout, trying, initially politely, to avoid some persistent esoteric amorous advances. No doubt, the grounds I picked up the lung infection but that’s a little unjust; I feel quite hip these days, sharing a serious autoimmune disease with a raft of celebrities. ‘Lady AppWhisperer‘, has a bit of a ring to it, don’t you think? The main treatment for serious autoimmune diseases (for the uninitiated) are strong immunosuppressant drugs. These are delivered to my home address every two weeks, straight from a refrigerated van, handed to me in person and placed immediately into my own fridge (middle shelf, with nothing touching the contents, ‘not too close to the back, front or sides‘, my nurse voiced, as she inspected my placement). Then every two weeks, I inject myself, the fun part is I get to select the location, will it be my left or right thigh this week? Or perhaps and I’m still striving to gain confidence, will it by my abdomen, just along from my tummy button, hmm – the mental battle continues for that one. The result is that in order to reduce the immune system attacking itself, my immune system is reduced to next to nothing, therefore, any bugs floating around, once caught, take quite a bit of shifting and this lung infection is still lingering and I foresee, will continue in a similar vein for the next week or so. It’s proving to be the hardest secondary illness I’ve had, since original diagnosis to eliminate…

Speaking of books, one was bought for me this week by my eldest son, Jake, ‘Do No Harm’ by Henry Marsh. It’s a book by a neurosurgeon (Henry Marsh) of forty years and once picked up, hard to put down. Perfect when you’re confined to bed. Reading the accounts and surgeries of his poor patients, certainly helped to keep my own predicament in perspective. One quote from this book stays with me “Anxiety might be contagious, but confidence is also contagious” and of course, that’s what we strive so hard, to build here at TheAppWhisperer for the community of talented mobile photographers and artists that share their work with us. This weeks mobile photography & Art Showcase is a bumper one (I missed last week, see above), as it plays out, you’ll view, what is sure to be called, a ‘superbly original and exquisite spellbinding twenty first love story’, asserted by many of the major mobile photographers and artists operating in our world today. It’s pure poetry, mysterious and yet glittering, enjoy!

Rita Colantonio, Deborah McMillion, Kristie Benoit, aka Tman, Jon Arne Foss, Paul Toussaint, Lorenka Campos, Isabel Afonso, borisbschulz2009, Paul Yan, Tomaso Belloni, Candice Railton, Susan Maxwell Schmidt, Susan Detroy, Kat McClelland, Jun Yamaguchi, zeeyan, Eduardo Llerandi, Ian Clarke, zeeyan, Eduardo Llerandi, Ian Clarke, Linda Hollier, Clint Cline, Catherine Caddigan, Laila, Oola Cristina, Gianluca Ricoveri, Vako Darispanashvili, Kate Zari Roberts, Judy Wahlberg, Susan Blase, Michael Beresin, Hanni K, TheiPhoneArtGirl – Meri Walker, Montse Abad, Karen Axelrad, Yasuo Furue, Basak Aytek, Poetic Medium, Catherine Caddigan, M. Cecilia Sao Thiago, Susan Rennie, Tuba Korhan, Fleur Schim, before.1st.light – Jane Schultz, Paula Broom.

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr/Instagram Group Showcase – 24 March 2019

2019-03-24 by Joanne Carter

As a journalist of many decades, I’ve always been attuned to what is communicated to me and mostly I commit it to memory. I store up conversations and it is a treat for me to unwrap them at will. I may be in the bath, and recall a glorious conversation that made me laugh many moons ago and will laugh out loud, much to the amusement of my family. I may wake in the night and remember somber stories I have been told or witnessed and thus shed tears. But now there’s a new phenomenon too, to gather stories. Since the implementation of the mobile phone, people appear to have loud one-sided conversations wherever they may be. It’s good timing for me, because I have severe hearing loss and have only had digital aids for a few years. Since having these aids fitted, a whole world has opened up, or so it seems. It took me a while to progress to wearing digital hearing aids all day, when you have has spent most of your life without aids, suddenly hearing everything, can be really challenging, as with any radical lifestyle change. I remember sitting in a Drs waiting room one day and I could hear the other patients talking to each other. When my GP called me in to her room, I asked her if it was ‘normal’ to be able to hear other patients talking in the waiting room and she said, ‘yes, that’s normal’. And so, when on the bus the other day, I should not have been surprised to overhear a conversation that a woman was having with a friend. It appeared (to me) that she really didn’t care who overheard when she confided that her boyfriend had left her, for another friend (since renamed to ‘that slag’) and she was trying to sell a necklace on eBay that he had given her. The problem was, eBayer’s didn’t appear to believe the necklace was genuine and she was determined ‘not to give it away’. She said ‘I don’t wanna wear it anymore, I don’t want to think of him around my neck, touching my body’. One person who was interested on eBay wanted to see a copy of the receipt for evidence it was a valuable item. She didn’t have it because the necklace had been a gift from her boyfriend and she wasn’t going to ask him for it ‘now that he’s with that slag’ and so it went on. I have no idea whether she ever did manage to sell the necklace, for what she wanted but I was almost quite ready to vouch its genuineness after I got off at my stop. Of course, one of the advantages of wearing hearing aids, is you can take them out at will and remain in complete silence and go back to peace and beautiful memories.

Next week, I’m going to be in the gorgeous city of Paris for most of the week at a press event. I’ll report back, wishing you all a beautiful week too.

Tricia Dewey, TheiPhoneArtGirl – Meri Walker, Sheriannnne, deanwgd608, Kat McClelland, jilllian2 – Jill Lian, Jun Yamaguchi, Susan Maxwell Schmidt, Bobby Chin, Rita Colantonio, Klaudia Cechini, Isabel Afonso, Candice Railton, Peter Wilkin, Lorenka Campos, Hanni K, Gina Costa, Sara Augenbraun, borisbschulz2009, Deborah McMillion, Clint Cline, Gianluca Ricoveri, p.a. hamel, Kate Zari Roberts, Susan Rennie, Manfred Majer, Barbara Braman, Catherine Caddigan, Fleur Schim.

Mobile Photography & Art – Tickle Your Fancy #62

2019-03-23 by Joanne Carter

Welcome back to our sixty second post in our Tickle Your Fancy section. ‘Tickle Your Fancy’ includes a round-up of between seven to eight links to articles from around TheAppWhisperer over the past few week, that you may by chance have missed. Please note, I’ve been a little unwell this week, so have not published as much as I wanted to.

Just to explain the title for this section Tickle Your Fancy is an English idiom and essentially means that something appeals to you and perhaps stimulates your imagination in an enthusiastic way, we felt it would make a great title for this new section of the site.

Artists cited include Amy Ecenbarger, Rita Colantonio, Valeria Cammareri, Deborah McMillion, Jenny Pieters, Feliz Ak, Kerry Mitchell, Fleur Schim, Diane Neubauer, Peter Wilkin, Lorenka Campos, Paul Yan, Paul Toussaint, Isabel Afonso, Catherine Caddigan, Ile Mont, p.a hamel, David DeNagel, Barbara Nebel, Karen Axelrad, Vadim Demjianov, Rob Pearson-Wright, Deborah McMillion, Linda Hollier, Rita C, Allyson, Tomaso Belloni, Yasuo Furue, 1968selin, Jun Yamaguchi, Clint Cline, Kat McClelland, Candice Railton, Gina Costa, Fleur Schim, before.1st.light – Jane Schultz, Gianluca Ricoveri, Kate Zari Roberts, Hanni K, Kate Zari Roberts, Barbara Braman.

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr/Instagram Group Showcase – 17 March 2019

2019-03-17 by Joanne Carter

‘Thank you for sleeping with us’, read the headline on my bill as I checked out of a hotel in Amsterdam this week. It amused me ‘thank you for sleeping with us’, why would they use that expression? Was it a nod to the infamous red light district around the corner? Being thanked for sleeping with someone, is a little patronising, don’t you think? I’ve not been thanked for sleeping with anyone before, neither have I returned the sentiment. If I was, I’d feel as if I had just completed a service, as opposed to sharing a vivaciously intimate moment. Or were they implying, how important it is to sleep well and to be ‘well slept individuals’? The bed and pillows were delightfully comfortable, more so than most and had I had the time to achieve the recommended eight hours, this would have been the place to do it. We’re under pressure from so many areas as the world unravels on so many levels and we are under increasing pressure to achieve eight solid hours sleep but surely this must be ideology at its purest? We have to make time to sleep but what if our time is not our own, as was the case in Amsterdam, it was a press trip. However, I did manage to etch out a few awoke solitary moments, in between meetings and they were divine. This was an adventure, I told myself, an intriguing quest, and one that I would regret not seeing through at least a little further along the way. I walked into the hotel restaurant, found a seat backing against a wall (my preferred seating placement), I could see all who approached me, as I ordered North Sea Chowder with a glass of Prosecco, from the attentive waiter, what could be more ambrosial? I delighted in the process, as the waiter asked if I was dining alone and I replied with glee, ‘yes’, he removed the opposing cutlery as the chilled Prosecco slipped slowly down my throat. It’s possible to carve out special moments, just for yourself, you just need to be disciplined enough. Self care is a radical act, let’s all to try to have a #selfcaresunday. The feminist poet Audre Lorde says: “Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it’s self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.” Wishing you all a beautiful Sunday.

Many congratulations to the following artists for being featured this week: Peter Wilkin, Lorenka Campos, Paul Yan, Paul Toussaint, Isabel Afonso, Catherine Caddigan, Ile Mont, p.a hamel, David DeNagel, Barbara Nebel, Karen Axelrad, Vadim Demjianov, Rob Pearson-Wright, Deborah McMillion, Linda Hollier, Rita C, Allyson, Tomaso Belloni, Yasuo Furue, 1968selin, Jun Yamaguchi, Clint Cline, Kat McClelland, Candice Railton, Gina Costa, Fleur Schim, before.1st.light – Jane Schultz, Gianluca Ricoveri, Kate Zari Roberts, Hanni K, Kate Zari Roberts, Barbara Braman.