TheAppWhisperer

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr/Instagram Group Showcase – 5 April 2020

2020-04-05 by Joanne Carter

Influenced by Susan Sontag, Maggie Nelson and Elaine Scarry, ‘The Art of the Body’ by Alexander Allison has perhaps been my fastest read yet. Not that there’s any race with reading, but sometimes, it’s so impossible for me to put a book down, that even when making dinner, I’ll prop a book open and this is what happened to me during this further week of lock down 2020. ‘The Art of the Body’ is a book about a woman, Janet, who cares a lot. She cares about what people think of her, she cares about the opportunities she’s wasted, she cares about the hurt she’s caused. But Janet is also paid to care – she’s responsible for the welfare of Sean, a young artist, living and working with Cerebral Palsy. The story explores dignity and art through an intimate examination of bodies at their most vulnerable. It’s a tale of all that really matters, the relationship between art and the body, becoming intimate with a body in a non sexual way, at times it’s an uncomfortable read but it’s so finely written and so resonant now. Sometimes, as artists, when our brief is so specifically limited, the art that we create becomes immensely affecting, so deft and the ultimate release. Whether you’re disabled or able bodied, art is a life-changer. Stay well, stay safe, stay at home.

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.

mitrydate, @iamerikabrown, @robertamitchel9675, @klimtt – M. Cecilia Sao Thiago, @remintrusions – Damian De Souza, @dinalf – Dina Alfasi, @nat.viola, @rodolfo.alcaraz, @claretaylor_ct, Filiz At, Jane Schultz, Susan Latty, Eliza Badoiu, Jennifer Graham, Ece Mizrakci, Janis Brandenburg, Jennifer Bracewell, be23mo, @artistunvield, Rita Colantonio, Kathy Clay, @anandamoy chatterji, Jun Yamaguchi, Lorenka Campos, Marguerite Khoury, Clint Cline, Lindy Ginn, Deborah McMillion, Vadim Demjianov, Karen Axelrad, Erik Viggh, Laila, Meri Walker, Gianluca Ricoveri, Judy Wahlberg, Chris Feichtner, Susan Rennie, Oola Cristina, Catherine Caddigan.

Music this week is ‘Don’t leave home’ by Dido

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.

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 – 15 March 2020

2020-03-222020-03-15 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. 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.

Lee Atwell, Deborah McMillion, Karen Axelrad, Laila, p.a. hamel, Jane Schultz, Catherine Caddigan, soul_engine, Mark Swanson, Lorenka Campos, Hanni K, Fleur Schim, Janine Graf, Andy Alexandre, Clint Cline, Tomaso Belloni, Jun Yamaguchi, Michael Brunsfeld, Peter Wilkin, Rita Colantonio, Gianluca Ricoveri, Susan Detroy, Judy Wahlberg, @niphisi, Elaine Taylor, Jenny Pieters, Eliza Badoiu, Jormain Cady, M. Cecilia Sao Thiago, @psychephoto – Robin Cohen, Susan Latty, @duca0onte, Damian De Souza, Marsha Estes @marshadraws, @accidental_artist3, Chehalis Hegner @chehalishegner.

Music this week is by Rhodes ‘Close your Eyes’

Mobile Photography & Art Showcase – 8 March 2020

2020-03-08 by Joanne Carter

Clive James the prolific Austrialian author, poet and broadcaster died late last year. I’ve always been a fan of his work, he made his name as a television critic, essayist and wit but he started as a poet and just over five years ago he was diagnosed with leukaemia, emphysema and kidney failure – he described it as ‘the lot’ and he ended as a poet.

There’s a particular story I remember reading about James, it goes like this…

One time he was going through a creative dry spell. He had written a play for the London stage and it bombed spectacularly. Not only did it ruin his family financially but it also cost him some dear friends. He fell into the deepest depression and shame. When the play closed, all he could do was sit on the sofa in his lounge and stare at the wall, mortified and humiliated. His wife held the family together, somehow. He did not feel he could ever write again. He stayed under this spell for a very long time. One day though, his young daughters interrupted his grieving process. They asked him if he could make their old scruffy secondhand bicycles look nicer. James obeyed, in a dutiful but not joyous manner. He carefully painted the girls bicycles in bright shades of red, frosted the wheel spokes with silver and when the paint dried he added tiny silver and gold stars all over the bicycles. ‘A field of exquisitely detailed constellations’. James couldn’t stop painting stars, the girls wanted their bicycles back and grew impatient. When at last he handed the bicycles back to the girls, they pedalled off up the road, on their magical ‘new’ bikes, completely thrilled and excited. The next day, his daughters brought home a little girl from school, who asked if he would paint stars on her bicycle. He did it. When that was done, another little girl turned up and soon there was a whole queue of little girls wanting him to paint stars on their bicycles.

James, one of the worlds greatest writers, spent weeks painting thousands of stars on little girls bicycles in his garage and as he did so, he began to recover. He realised that he really did want to keep on creating things and as he did so, he was healing, something was coming back to life within him. He thought, ‘I will write about this someday’, when he thought this he realised he was free and the creator had returned.

As always, this is another fabulous week of mobile photography and art, 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 #theappwhisperer.

Many congratulations to the following featured artists this week including:

Jenny Pieters, Jennifer Graham, Nancy McClure, Nina Papel, Deborah Morbet, Fiona Christian, Rita Colantonio, Jennifer Bracewell, Maria Moscoso, Jane Schultz, @da_ny_550, mitrydate, Lorenka Campos, Rita Tipunina, Peter Wilkin, Cathrine Halsor, Jean Hutter, Cintia Malhotra, Marsha Estes, Becky Menzies, @terrible.bones.photography, Susan Latty, Boris Schulz, G R Fotos, Deborah McMillion, Gianluca Ricoveri, Candice Railton, Jun Yamaguchi, Jill Lian, G Billon, P. A Hamel, Susan Rennie, Chhororo.

Music this week is ‘Falling Too’ ©Veda

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr/Instagram Group Showcase – 16 February 2020

2020-02-16 by Joanne Carter

Fatigue with the stress of life, current news, financial worries, sickness, broken relationships, abuse, wreak havoc. As I shot my (medicinal) drug needle miraculously through my fingernail instead of my thigh this week, I know and it hurts but there’s also something called ‘compassion fatigue’ in relation to photography. It is so called when people view vast quantites of shocking images, perhaps photojournalism from a warzone for example and they become muted, to the visual atrocities before their eyes. From as early as the 1980’s ‘compassion fatigue’ was also known as ‘Secondary Traumatic Stress Disorder’, essentially it developed from an excess of compassion. David Campbell, Director of Programs and Outreach at the World Press Photo Foundation, has written a time pressing essay on the subject entitled ‘the dream of photojournalism and the cultural anxiety of images’, I urge you to engage with it. I further researched this subject and was satiated to read, Jeremy Adelman’s, (Henry Charles Lea professor of history and director of the Global History Lab at Princeton University) essay entitled ‘Don’t Look Away’. He said, ‘when Susan Sontag composed her first essay on photography, for Epstein and Silvers, she was thinking about ‘Napalm Girl’. The sight of her agonised face ‘was more memorable than a hundred hours of televised barbarities, it may even,’ she speculated, ‘have done more than anything else to mobilise the anti-War movement.’

In 2020 as we navigate between connection and isolation, company and solitude, know that when you’re creating mobile photography and art you are driving the framentary narrative forward, we can change things, for the better. This weeks carefully curated mobile photography and art showcase gets under your skin and leads the way for the ultimate climax. Enjoy!

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 #theappwhisperer.

Many congratulations to the following featured artists this week including:

borisbschulz2009, G Billon, Susan Detroy, Susan Rennie, Jane Schultz, Gianluca Ricoveri, Andy Alexandre, Jill Lian, Rita Colantonio, Candice Railton, Lorenka Campos, Joseph Cyr, Milly M, Jun Yamaguchi, Clare Taylor, j.a graham, Eliza Badoiu, Jenny Pieters, @bortolinimassimo, Ile Mont, Sarah Bichachi, Christine Mignon, Alisa Smith Williams, Amo Passicos, Kim Clayton, Dina Alfasi, Rodolfo Alcaraz, Jean Hutter, Adrian McGarry, Mehmet Duyulmus.

Music this week – ‘Over the Love’ Florence and the Machine

50%LoveDiscount in our Online Gallery of select Mobile Photography and Art

2020-02-15 by Joanne Carter

This week we’re celebrating our love of mobile photography and art more so than ever. Within our online gallery, we celebrate and represent award-winning mobile photographers and artists. It is a professional online gallery specialising in prints for discerning collectors of unique, previously unseen and not available for sale elsewhere, mobile photography and art. We ship to clients in the UK, US, Europe and Far East. Our customers are a global group of collectors looking for exclusive art to hang in their homes and offices. We sell signed limited edition photographs of the full realm of genres of mobile photography and art. We ship from London via The Print Space. If you’ve been wondering just how good the quality of our art and prints really are, then take this opportunity to enjoy 50% off throughout the store. We rarely have sales, so please have a look.

Our 50%LoveDiscount code will be automatically applied at checkout and will expire on 21 February 2020.

Visit our gallery, here

with, Anca Balaj, Maria Cecilia de Sao Thiago, Sarah Bichachi, Glenn Homann, Christine O Sobczak, Jill Lian, Jane Schultz, Gianluca Ricoveri, Susan Rennie, Lorenka Campos, Helen Breznik, Paul Suciu, Peter Wilkin, Sean Hayes, Mare Nostrum Exhibition – Sukru Mehmet Omur.

Mobile Photography/Art Pic of the Day (1,194) via Instagram

2020-02-13 by Joanne Carter

Here’s day one thousand, one hundred and ninety four of our mobile photography/art Pic of the Day section via Instagram. Each day we select one image a day for our Pic of the Day section on Instagram, with this hashtag #theappwhisperer.

Today, we congratulate @lorenka – Lorenka Campos with this image entitled ‘I read the news today, oh boy’.

Follow her Instagram account here

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr/Instagram Group Showcase – 9 February 2020

2020-02-092020-02-09 by Joanne Carter

“I’m with Edvard Munch, who said photography can’t compete with painting, because it can’t deal with heaven or hell”, said David Hockney in today’s Sunday Times. I’m inclined to disagree with this and of course, I can point to this weeks showcase to support my case. Our musical choice matches perfectly, love, loss and the nature of reality. Heaven and hell? Oh yes, having lived full lives, if we cannot cure mortality, should we at least die trying…? The one thing humans have to save them of the depths of despair is humour and like many I have a strong one, Hockney does too “Do you know why laughter is important?” he asks, “It’s the only time as human beings that our fight-or-flight response is turned off. It’s good for you.” I couldn’t agree more…

I hope you all love this weeks mobile photography and art showcase as much as I do. 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 #theappwhisperer.

Many congratulations to the following featured artists this week including:

Jill Lian, Platohedron, Lorenka Campos, Rita Colantonio, Cintia, Fleur Schim, Sailisa Li, Laila, Paul Suciu – @rain.is.poetry, Marsha Estes, Rodolfo Alcaraz, Lee Atwell, @amopassicos, Nichole Christophe. @imagomimago – Mimi Svanberg, M. Cecilia Sao Thiago, @bortolinimassimo, @withflowersinherphone, soul_engine, Milly M, Jane Schultz, Jill Lian, Enio Godoy, Catherine Caddigan, p.a. hamel, Judy Wahlberg, Gianluca Ricoveri, Erik Viggh, Rosalie Heller, Linda Hollier, Susan Latty, Mary Modale – Dale, Robin Robertis, kats_eye_phone, Robyn Mencher, patragraphy, Alexis Rotella, clau_clara.

Music this week, another of my favourites ‘Never Let Me Go’ by Florence & The Machine

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr/Instagram Group Showcase – 2 February 2020

2020-02-02 by Joanne Carter

“Creativity requires the courage to let go of certainties“, writes Erich Fromm, one of the most prescient thinkers of the 20th century. Love and creativity play a huge part of my life and it is physical. Love of art, the art of loving, irrational, intellectual, obsessive, insightful. Professor Semir Zeki, a neurobiologist at the University College London, proved in a series of pioneering brain-mapping experiments that viewing art triggers a surge of dopamine, the feel-good chemicial, into the orbito-frontal cortex of the brain, resulting in feelings of intense pleasure, the same part of the brain that is excited, when we fall for someone, romantically. For all of us associated with mobile photography and art, we already know this, mobile art is our fix just like illicit drug taking, we feel immediate stimulation and like a drug, our reward centres crave for more. I also believe it is not just the viewers but also the creators of mobile art, that reach for that high too. Love, like creatvity, requires courage, to let ourselves go, as Fromm described above. It’s fierce trust, it demands you put forth your work, without knowing an outcome because fierce trust knows that the outcome does not matter, it cannot matter. Keep sharing your work, each one of you reading this was born to create. Ask yourself, how fierce is your trust in that love? Keep creating, keep viewing, it’s our labour of love.

Many congratulations to the following featured artists this week including:

Clint Cline, Jerry Clack, jilllian2 – Jill Lian, Susan Blase, Hanni K, Lorenka Campos, Fleur Schim, Oola Cristina, Jayita Mallik, @imagomimago – Mimi Svanberg, @do.brze, Susan Latty, @honor_life – Irene Oleksiuk, @marymodale – Dale Botha, Beate Goralczyk, Dina Alfasi, Thelma Penteado, @jules4921 – Rita Colantonio, Janis Brandenburg, @winter__lines, @rain.is.poetry – Paul Suciu, @miandreai – Marius Andrei, Rosalie Heller, @rodrigobw – Rodrigo Vieira, @luison – Lrh, @jawdoc2, Alexis Rotella, @cardinphotography, Filiz Ak, thefringeproject, Jun Yamaguchi, Jane Schultz, Laila, Gianluca Ricoveri.

Music this week is ‘Breathe’ by Fleurie

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr/Instagram Group Showcase – 26 January 2020

2020-01-26 by Joanne Carter

“Genuinely, I couldn’t give a damn about wrinkles, or middle age or putting on weight or my first grey hairs or reading specs – these are reasons to celebrate”, said Dr Rachel Clarke, a palliative care doctor in her new moving memoir entitled ‘Dear Life’. These are very similar words that I heard from our dear friend and artist Carolyn Hall Young, who stayed with all of us until her passing. Books by doctors have become extremely popular over the past few years, they bring the reader closer to worlds they may have indeed been a part of but on the other side of the fence. My eldest son Jake, when he wishes to buy me a present and he’s the sweetest, knows that a good Dr book will keep me willingly distracted and rested until I’ve devoured it in its entirety, which doesn’t take long. Although, I do find myself, still annoyingly, being frustrated about wrinkles, middle age, reading specs and in my case weight loss, there’s a depth to my annoyance which more than covers my gratitude to still actually being here, with you all. In the UK we have a belief that we call and provide ‘cradle to grave care’ sadly due to NHS underfunding, this has become a fallacy. And I could give you all sorts of depressing statics about it but really, we don’t actually need to know. What we do here and now, with every immensely precious moment that we have together, is what really matters. What you all do best is to create the most stunning mobile photography and art, the greatest actually and with each creation an artist makes within our community, each one I view, I silently call a MasterPeace. In light of this, I have created a new style of interview entitled Mobile MasterPeace and intend to publish those in the coming weeks, for now though, bask with us in this weeks absolute glory of a showcase of Mobile MasterPeace.

Many congratulations to the following featured artists this week including:

@wemarriage_goddess, @marshadraws, @ja_graham, @cardinphotography, @before.1st.light – Jane Schultz, Diane Neubauer, Paul Suicu, Janis Brandenburg, Dina Alfai, Eliza Badoiu, Nico Brons, Christine Mignon, @sodium_light22 – Jenny Pieters, Laila Bakker, @klimtt – M. Cecilia Sao Thiago, Mimi Svanberg, @pause.and.breathe – Susan Latty, Rita Colantonio, Juta Jazz, Jennifer Bracewell, Hanni K, Jeremy Cassell, Lorenka Campos, P.A. Hamel, Clint Cline, Debara Splendorio, Susan Maxwell Schmidt, Oola Cristina, Gianluca Ricoveri, Milly M, Deborah McMillion, Jill Lian, Manfred Majer.