Paul Toussaint Archives - TheAppWhisperer

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr/Instagram Group Showcase – 26 May 2019

26/05/201926/05/2019 by Joanne Carter

“As soon as the vote of Brexit came through, half the people I know were trying desperately to work out whether they had Irish grandmothers. But I would never take dual German nationality because I owe this country too much, and I wouldn’t want to dilute it”. Deeply loyal, Judith Kerr speaking in the Financial Times in 2017. Commonly known, within Britain, as our ‘national treasure’, Kerr led a remarkable life and wrote and illustrated the most enchanted children’s stories. I was so saddened to read that she had died this week, born in 1923 into a bourgeois Jewish family in Weimar, Berlin. Her father, Alfred was a famed theatre critic and essayist and her mother, as well as housewife (no small task), a talented composer. Alfred was outspoken in his prose and it attracted enemies. Not least when it came to mocking the Nazis and as soon as Hilter became Chancellor in 1933, the family fled Germany. Nine year old Kerr and her elder brother Michael, with their mother escaped by train across the border to Switzerland, after a few months, penniless, they arrived in Paris. Kerr wrote how she loved the ‘brevity of the French (language) after the endless sentences in German’. Fortunately, for the family, the film director, Alexander Korda, a Hungarian Jew, working in Britain, bought Alfred’s script about Napoleon’s mother and this enabled them to move to England and therefore avoid the Nazis invasion of France in 1940. The film was never made and Kerr always suspected he only bought the script to save their lives.

A fascinating story and there’s so much more I could tell you about her life. Most of all, I am grateful for the influence she has had on my own small family. Two of my children have serious developmental disorders, along with specific learning difficulties and I read and snuggled up with them relentlessly when they were younger. So, it really warmed me when speaking with my middle son, Jovian (almost 18), who was actually the only child consciously wandering around the house, when I started to compose this Sunday’s showcase early this morning. I said to him, ‘Good Morning Jove, do you remember when I used to read ‘The Tiger Who Came To Tea’, when when you were little?’. He hesitated, but of course, once I showed him the glorious illustrations, he recalled the story instantly and he smiled warmly with the memories and thus his smile ignited me and gave me another excuse to hug him. That’s the legacy that Kerr has left behind, to many families, a warm embrace with enchanted memories firmly planted in our souls. Very often, children’s authors, try to ‘get rid of the parents’, in order to build the excitment of the story, but Kerr kept the parents as central to her work and that’s an aspect that I really appreciated. My tiny family mean the world to me and I really wanted them to feel that parents can actually be fun and enjoy their excitement too. I still recall my children’s eyes widening when it came to the part of Sophie’s parents taking her out to tea (after dark) – because the tiger had eaten all their food – what an adventure, what magic!

This is the influence of art and all that you do, all that you create. When creating mobile art, remember, it’s not just you that feels the warmth of your creations, it’s the rest of us. Draw, paint, photograph everything, you’re gifts are priceless.

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.

Candice Railton, Hanni K, Rob Pearson-Wright, Paul Toussaint, Eduardo Llerandi, Arko Rayhan, Jun Yamaguchi, Deborah McMillion, Lorenka Campos, Damian De Souza, Kathy Clay, Judy Wahlberg, Susan Rennie, before.1st.light – Jane Schultz, pa.a hamel, Anatasia Potekhina, TheiPhoneArtGirl – Meri Walker, Woltarise, Rita Colantonio, Gianluca Ricoveri, Yasuo Furue, Michael Hamments.

Music this week is ‘Love Heals Us All’ Dave Tough

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

19/05/201919/05/2019 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 – 7 April 20019

07/04/201907/04/2019 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!

Music this week – ‘You’re Still With Me (alternative ending) ©Ali Handal

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 – Tickle Your Fancy #62

23/03/2019 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

17/03/2019 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.

Music this week is ‘If Only For A Moment’ ©The Weak Need

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr Group Showcase – 15 July 2018

15/07/201815/07/2018 by Joanne Carter

‘How to fail’ is a podcast series by journalist and novelist Elizabeth Day, whereupon she interviews celebrities and asks them to list three examples, demonstrating their failures in life. Perhaps, not surprisingly, men somewhat balked at the idea that they’d failed at anything and when pressed, admitted to losing tennis matches, or the inability to get souffles to rise, whereas women confessed they had trouble limiting the list to just three failures. Naturally, my thoughts drifted to my own failures, where to start… trying too hard to find love as a teenager complete with ‘mistakes’…, not selling my first cottage before the property crash in 1990 when I was 21, progressing too soon with pregnancy following major liver surgery, I could go on, of course. Day explains “the only way to survive [life crises] is to surrender to the process”. Like Day, it dawned on me that I had my work and I am lucky because my work here at TheAppWhisperer, comfortably means I am never fully alone, I always have the most gracious company, by my side. And you’ll see them in his weeks’ Mobile Photography & Art showcase, a glowing example of true, dear artists. And, actually, when looking at my failures, I could also see my successes, which curiously ran alongside. Had I not been so starved of love as a young girl, I may not have met the man that I married, who worships, not only ever area of my physical body, but also my mind, he is my nourishment, he is my strength. Had I indeed sold my cottage in 1990, then I would not have had a place to rehabilitate, following major life saving liver surgery in 1993. Had I not become pregnant in late 1995, my dear son, Jake would not be here, with us today. The riches of life can sometimes only be learned from our failures. As Day who listed divorce as one her failures explained, as she folded her wedding dress into a box, wrapping it carefully in layers of tissue paper for the nice woman in Shropshire who had bought it on eBay realised, this wasn’t failure at all, it was a part of life, she had learned from it and now she was letting it go, the failure had departed, the creator had returned.

Enjoy this triumph of a showcase, each singular image has the capacity to provoke and to surprise, each one, full of life.

Thank you to all artists for submitting your works. 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.

Many congratulations to the following artists for being featured this week:

Maarten Oortwjin, borisbschulz2009, Catherine Caddigan, nheco, Dina Alfasi, nashira190, Poetic Medium, Raja Cretonne, Francesco Sambati, Paul Toussaint, jillian2 – Jill Lian, Luison – Lrh – , Clare Pickett, Shel Serkin, Sui Sawada, I Rome, gcosta9 – Gina Costa, Kate Zari Roberts, Nick Kenrick, Kathy Clay, Marianne Rieter, Gianluca Ricoveri, Susan Rennie, Lorenka Campos, Deborah McMillion, Jun Yamaguchi, before.1st.light – Jane Schultz, Ghost, Linda Hollier, Cindy Buske, TheiPhoneArtGirl – Meri Walker.

Music this week – ‘Oxygen’ ©Stephanie Schneiderman

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr Group Showcase – 24 June 2018

24/06/2018 by Joanne Carter

To many artists in this weeks Mobile Photography & Art Showcase, and beyond, mobile art is a coping mechanism. Creating art allows us to live alternative lives, whether for ourselves or for our subjects. This weeks showcase should be recognised as own emblem, forever moving forward whilst simultaneously sensing time’s passage, evidence that is cognizant in our art. Dorothea Lange said it best with “A camera is a tool, for learning how to see without a camera“. This week we share a brilliantly delineated context of imagination whilst recognising among the first avant garde artists of the mobile camera. Enjoy!

Many congratulations to the following artists for being featured this week:

Gabriele Rodriquez, Paul Toussaint, jillian2 – Jill Lian, Amy Ecenbarger, Lorenka Campos, Clint Cline, Catherine Caddigan, Joseph Cyr, Yasuo Furue, Kat McClelland, jon jon, Corbicus Maximus, Amo Passicos, Paul Yan, Valeria Cammareri, Jerry Clack, Poetic Medium, Candice Railton, Jun Yamaguchi, Kathy Clay, Gianluca Ricoveri, Dina Alfasi, Sarah Kuhn, before.1st.light – Jane Schultz, Clare Pickett, Kate Zari Roberts, Damian De Souza, Jill Lian – jillian2, Yasuo Furue, Grace Brignolle, Kristie Michele Art – Kristie Benoit, Candice Railton, Susan Rennie, Susan Maxwell Schmidt, I Rome, Giancarlo Beltrame, Shel Serkin,

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr Group Showcase – 13 May 2018

13/05/2018 by Joanne Carter

One of the many things I love about curating, producing and publishing our Mobile Photography & Art Flickr Group Showcase is it offers me the facility to tap into these talented artists lives. Many of the artists that we profile each Sunday morning are extraordinarily prolific with their art and when viewing the showcase, each image doesn’t stand on its own, more so as together, context is all. The more you move among the pictures, shifting back and forrth, the more your sense of mobile photography and art deepens, expanding by the moment. All of these image take their part in a growing narrative, one we continue to explore. Enjoy!

Many congratulations to the following artists for being featured this week:

Francesco Sambati, Marguerite Khoury, Gabriele Rodriquez, Kat McClelland, Joury Gagarin, Jun Yamaguchi, Lorenka Campos, M W, Paul Toussaint, Catherine Caddigan, Luison, Jeppe Kabell, Karen Axelrad, Lydia Cassatt, Broadgreen, Vinita Barretto, Deborah McMillion, Marietjie du Toit, Juta Jazz, Poetic Medium, Kate, Paul Yan, Dragan Fly, Nick Kenrick, David Hayes, Susan Maxwell-Schmidt, Candice Railton, Gianluca Ricoveri, Valeria Cammareri, jillian2 – Jill Lian, Christopher Baxter, Gina Costa, Ade Santora, Susan Rennie, before.1st.light – Jane Schultz, Candice Railton, kbARToszuk,

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr Group Showcase – 22 April 2018

23/04/201822/04/2018 by Joanne Carter

This weeks Mobile Photography & Art Flickr Group Showcase is a love letter, not only to each artist but instinctively to the centrality of art and culture within each of our lives. It’s wholly satisfying, with the trajectory of relationships like lovers, talking themselves in and out of our beds. Light that post-coital cigarette and enjoy!

Many congratulations to the following artists for being featured this week:

klimtt – Cecilia Sao Thiago, Marguerite Khoury, Deborah McMillion, Vadim Demjianov, rorofot, Jun Yamaguchi, Clint Cline, Sergiy Beliayev, Jean Hutter, Hanni K, Shel Serkin, Valeria Cammareri, Basak Aytek, Lorenka Campos, Paul Yan, Kate Zari Roberts, Catherine Caddigan, Luison – Lrh, Mimages, Amanda Parker, Candice Railton, Nick Kenrick, David Hayes, Paul Toussaint, Burcu Basar, Juta Jazz, Lydia Cassatt, Ayln Argun, Gianluca Ricoveri, Robi Gallardo, Damian De Souza, Lorenka Campos, Dragan Fly, Susan Rennie, Tuba, before.1st.light – Jane Schultz, Allyson Marie, Barbara Nebel, Corbicus Maximus, Karen Axelrad.

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr Group Showcase – 15 April 2018

15/04/2018 by Joanne Carter

Urgently contemporary, this weeks mobile photography and art flickr group showcase is a huge thrill and I know all about thrills. This week I chatted with a friend, one I’ve not seen for such a long time. The most charming man, the most fragrant and also the most generous. Slipping back into rambling conversations about, art, photography and sex, we absorbed and absolved one another as we nudged the English language to its limits. Art as in life, is about desire and the mobile photographers and artists that we have featured in this weeks showcase, have satiated mine. There’s real humanity in this showcase, with insights into love and longing with the under current narrative, stimulating and deeply rewarding. Enjoy!

Many congratulations to the following artists for being featured this week:

Basak Aytek, Oksana Shendrik, Christine Padmore, Jean Hutter, Catherine Caddigan, Lorenka Campos, jillian2 – Jill Lian, Luison – Lrh Acquetico, borisbschulz2009, Tricia Dewey, Jun Yamaguchi, Serigy Beliayev, woltarise, David Hayes, Jeronimo Sanz, Damian De Souza, Nick Kenrick, Kat McClelland, Paul Yan, Deborah McMillion, Kathy Clay, Vanessa Vox, Gabriele Rodriquez, Amy Ecenbarger, Ralf Mauyog, Linda Hollier, eyenantajrean, Poetic Medium, CLAY3 accidentTal arTisT, Vadim Demjianov, Clint Cline, Gianluca Ricoveri, Paul Toussaint, soul_engine, Barbara Nebel, Jane Schultz – before.1st.light, Kerry Mitchell, Candice Railton, Tomaso Belloni, Allyson Marie, Sheldon Serkin, Frederic Hutter, Lydia Cassatt, Sally Allerton, Susan Rennie, Marianne Rieter, Hanni K, Aylin Argun.