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 – 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 Showcase – 23 February 2020

2020-02-232020-02-23 by Joanne Carter

Sally Brampton (founding editor of Elle magazine, UK – who killed herself after health professionals ‘missed opportunities to offer her help’, in 2016) said in her memoir on depression: “We are simply defeated by the long, hard struggle to stay alive. When somebody dies after a long illness, people are apt to say, with a note of approval: ‘He fought so hard.’ And they are inclined to think, about a suicide, that no fight was involved, that somebody simply gave up. This is quite wrong.” And so, this week, my thoughts have been with the local family of a 15 year old boy from my daughters school who killed himself. Of course, a well known British celebritiy also did this last Saturday, even with the same method. Except I’m not ‘allowed‘ to discuss the method as The Smaritans warn of the dangers of ‘imitational sucicidal behaviour‘ and request that there’s no placement regarding actual methods. But if we don’t talk about it, aren’t we ignoring mental illness and that’s become so ‘popular‘ to talk about right now? There are more suicides, certainly for poeple under 35 and more so males, than there are road deaths currently per year. Artists are also one of the leading groups of whom suicide is common. ‘Tortured Geniuses’ are most likely to commit sucide, the first-ever study of suicide by professionals from the ONS, which covered England in the years from 2011 to 2015, showed that people who work in arts-related jobs are up to four times more likely to commit suicide. People, are so ashamed, hurt, overwhelmed for so many reasons, that they’d rather end their lives, than seek help. It was reported this week, that Caroline Flack, the celebrity I mentioned above, did reach out to a friend but her friend told her it was too much for her. If we don’t talk about it, when someone approaches us, if we don’t soothe them, offer support, listen, then aren’t we ignoring the obvious, of what will inevitably come? They already feel ignored and unsupported. Isn’t that why people confide? We must continue to talk, we must support, mentor and above all, care… isn’t that why we’re here?

In the UK the Samaritans can be contacted on 116 123. In the US, the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is 1-800-273-8255. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. Other international suicide helplines can be found at www.befrienders.org.

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:

Enio Godoy, Deborah McMillion, Rita Colantonio, Jun Yamaguchi, Milly M, Candice Railton, Jean Hutter, Jill Lian, Jon Arne Foss, Gianluca Ricoveri, Catherine Caddigan, p.a. hamel, Susan Maxwell Schmidt, Lee Atwell, j.a. Graham, @deborahmorbetoffinear, M. Cecilia Sao Thiago, @berleyart – Kim Clayton, Linda Hollier, Rejane Rubino, @sunflowerof21_365 – Elaine Taylor, Michael Vaile Garner, Janis Brandenburg, @remintrusions – Damian De Souza, @Badgrowshop, Brendan O Se, @marshadraws – Marsha Estes, @ange_ombre, @jormain, Eliza Badoiu, Alisa Smith Williams, Jane Schultz.

Music this week is ‘The Other Side’ by Ruelle

Mobile Photography/Art Pic of the Day (1,154) via Instagram

2019-11-22 by Joanne Carter

Here’s day one thousand, one hundred and fifty 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 @-soulkitchen_ Valeria Cammareri with this stunning image, entitled ‘(Naples, October 2019. From my recent workshop)‘.

To view more of her work, please go here.

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr/Instagram Group Showcase – 10 November 2019

2019-11-152019-11-10 by Joanne Carter

Many people write to me each week and I love it. Sometimes, I am asked for advice, sometimes I’m asked about me. This week a few times, it was mostly the latter. I was asked, ‘how do you keep coming up with ideas?’, ‘where do they generate from?‘ and then ‘how do you deal with a creative rut?‘. I think the latter was the hardest because the first two I answered with ‘I’m constantly gathering ideas, things that I see each day, people I meet, observations that I make, judgements (I hate to say), but they all encapsulate and become the images and ideas that I’ve been having for the past ten years and I amalgamate them’. To answer, ‘how do you deal with a creative rut?‘, was a lot tougher. I love writing but sometimes I get stuck, as I am with one project now, that has pained me for too many tortuous months. I don’t have a solid process, sometimes I surprise myself that anything gets written at all. But sometimes, I get an idea and find the angle I need and write the whole thing up in no time, wtf. When I get stuck, when I hit a creative rut, I have to take myself out of all of the usual things that I do. So, I’ll pick up a book for example, that might have absolutely nothing to do with creativity, if I can say that, because the fact that it’s been written is a sign of creativity isn’t it? – yes, I frequently argue with myself. Anyway, if you haven’t read Naomi Wolf’s book, Vagina, then you should, specifically the paragraph on the creative power of the orgasm, it really helped me to formulate my next project and reminded me of a quote within the main tome that I am currently re-reading, Sontag by Benjamin Moser, chapter 12, when Sontag has an affair with ‘Irene’ who was by all accounts totally luscious and Sontag was quoted as saying ‘she could make a rock come‘, how glorious! Writing can be a lonely occupation but sometimes ideas flow out of me like a goddam fountain climaxing. I would say, as I have often repeated, resilience is key, and remember when you were 20 and looking forward, never back? As you get older, when the going gets tough, people look back, why do that? I don’t do that. Life is still in front of you and it’s that that needs to be treasured. Keep going…

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.

rain.is.poetry – Paul Suciu, _soulkitchen_ – Valaria Cammari, @iameirkabrown – Erika Brown, @eslieber – Erik Lieber, @ilemusi – Ile Mont, Nichole Christophe, Jana Curcio, @chalktiger, Eliza Badoiu, @jorgeolaveriveros, @ja_graham, @accidental_artist, Rosalie Heller, @thelma.penteado, @josephineduson, @marshadraws – Marsha Estes, @iphotami – Karen Axelrad, pause.and.breathe – Susan Latty, @luison_street – Lrh A, @patragraphy, @mitrydate, @velvet_iris_photography, Peter Wilkin, @schwitter.li, Laila, Jun Yamaguchi, woltarise, Yasuo Furue, Clint Cline, Hanni K, Rita Colantonio, Linda Hollier, Gianluca Ricoveri, Susan Rennie, Sheldon Serkin, Judy Wahlberg, Andy Alexandre, @nini_nini-, Allyson Marie, @before.1st.light – Jane Schultz,

Music this week is Nina Simone – Feeling Good (Avicii Remix)

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr/Instagram Group Showcase – 3 November 2019

2019-11-032019-11-03 by Joanne Carter

“Romantic love is an obsession, it possesses you“, said Dr Helen Fisher, an anthropologist in her book ‘Why we Love‘ and it’s true. It’s incredibly distracting, falling in love and yet it is perhaps the greatest natural high there is. When you mix Oxytocin – the love hormone with a good amount of Dopamine (the pleasure hormone), you get a very heady mix, perhaps you could say, it makes us insane but what if you’re not looking to fall in love and it creeps up on you when you least expect it…then that’s not walking on air, that’s flying by the seat of your pants… Can falling in love be diagnosed? I asked myself this week and I found the answer, according to Freud, yes, pretty much and there’s even a genuine condition called ‘broken-heart syndrome‘ when/if/usually things head west – and even knowing that that happens and it’s basically awful, we still crave the primary high. When you fall in love, everything looks better, the rain becomes gentle kissing drops on your face, as opposed to wet, cold, ghastly drops. A traffic jam becomes another excuse to dream of your loved one, as opposed to a delay for an appointment that’s going to cost you dearly. Actually, falling in love is getting into a beautiful trap set up by nature, a natural occurence that’s very hard to fight. The term ‘love is blind’, I feel is fitting, because you never know when your brain will encounter love. It’s a natural muse, one that will leave you puzzled and in deep thought…possessed even and ultimately exhausted…

Kathy Clay – @kathyc2136, Catherine Caddigan, @setanua – Seta Nua, Anca.balaj, Susan Latty, luison – Lrh Aquietco, ja_graham, @winter_lines, @imagomimago – Mimi Svanberg, jproudman.art – Joan Proudman, Filiz Ak, MaryJane Rosenfeld, @berleyart – Kim, clau_clara, @xxfromneptune – Aylin Argun, @patragraphy, mitrydate, effe5 – Guido Colla, Annette Armitage – @aaoffie, @hipstanitaelle – Anita Elle, Karen Axelrad, Cindy Buske, Hanni K, Jane Schultz, Deborah McMillion, Susan Rennie, p.a. hamel, Judy Wahlberg, Gianluca Ricoveri, Manuela Basaldella, Vadim Demjianov, Qingxian Guo, Susan Blase, Cintia Malhotra, Paul Toussaint, Arko Rayhan, Rita Colantonio, Andy Alexandre, Jun Yamaguchi, Michael Beresin.

This weeks’ music is by London Grammar, entitled ‘Wicked Game’ a very fitting song this week.

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr/Instagram Group Showcase – 22 September 2019

2019-09-222019-09-22 by Joanne Carter

The three of us, our bodies sharing a common goal and process, the same level of exhaustion reached – potentially. Coming together, tearing apart. Despite the degradation of our bodies, we pushed through. Toll was the point, haggard breaths, sweating foreheads, shaking thighs, pushed to the limits, exhaustion was the symptom but not the goal. The late night service station off the motorway, still somewhere far up North, was stark. But contained pockets of human existence joined by essential basic common needs, in the dead of the night. A millennial loved up couple, cuddled in the queue, ecstatic with the elation of food quashing their hunger, the woman pirouette’s around her man, rocking her ample breasts simultaneously, he yawns. A family, wife/mother (45) hunched and dressed in a hoodie, texting frantically, the husband/father (49) repeating loudly ‘I am so angry’ , the boy (12) expressing ‘she’s only going to live in the car for a year, Dad’. The sister (13) staring blankly into space. Another couple, man (65) woman (25) wander slowly into view, heads down, the woman I notice with heinous black inflamed eye, as they share an order booth. She selects (with difficulty) their food, her elongated manicured white nails, not fit for a touch screen. Another couple, man (29), woman (70) attempt to select their food in the booth with coupon codes, it takes 25 minutes for them to choose, as they finalise the order, the woman cries, she wanted to add a hot chocolate, they begin again. And now it’s the two of us, having left our middle son, miles and miles up the motorway, at university, we drive home, semi autonomously. Sometimes I feel I can do without the present, the past is more than enough, I silently weep, a job well done. Homeward bound…we change gear.

clau_clara, marshadraws, _soulkitchen_, dayindigo, wstairs, ja_graham, joe.legrand61, klimtt – M. Cecilia Sao Thiago, ilemusi – Ile Mont, clizit2020 – Clint Cline, mitrydate, thelma.penteado, cooksbay, alisasmithwilliams, laurence_bouchard, coeiphoneart – Gerry Coe, rejanerubino, berleyart, lillorizzo, ritaipunina, dinalf – Dina Alfasi, eva.peopleoflondon, imaco57 – Isabel Alfonso, csernusphotography, kein_grund, Lee Atwell, p.a. hamel, Susan Rennie, Gianluca Ricoveri, Andy Alexandre, Jennifer Bracewell, Cintia, Sebastian Burczyk, Jun Yamaguchi, Damian De Souza, Tomaso Belloni, Lorenka Campos, Deborah McMillion, Christine O Sobczak.

Music this week is by Freya Ridings entitled ‘Lost Without You’

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr/Instagram Group Showcase – 15 September 2019

2019-09-162019-09-15 by Joanne Carter

“Help I have done it again. I have been here many times before. Hurt myself again today, and, the worst part is there’s no one else to blame. Be my friend, hold me, wrap me up, unfold me, I am small, I’m needy, warm me up, and breathe me. Ouch! I have lost myself again, lost myself and I am no where to be found, yeah, I think that I might break, lost myself again again and I feel unsafe, Be my friend, hold me, wrap me up, unfold me, I am small, I’m needy, warm me up and breathe me….” lyrics to this weeks immaculate mobile photography and art showcase, Sia, entitled ‘Breathe Me’. Be kind, be kind, be kind, this week I learned a dear friend had lost her son, and there are words to say about this, you’ll find them all above… just love, all, support, do not withdraw, be kind.

Eliza Badoiu, mitrydate, jaleyuce4 – Jale Yuce, clau_clara – Claú Clará, yembo, Sarah Bichachi, jenni_bea – Jenni Bea, dinalf – Dina Alfasi, kats_eye_phone, bortolinimassimo, headattacks – Manuella Basselda, pause.and.breathe, piccionistefania – Stefania Piccioni, catalin_gherasim, filizakart – Filiz Art, dinga.diary, Lorenka Campos, ange_ombre, klimtt – M. Cecilia Sao Thiago, Peter Wilkin, ritatipunina – Rita Tipunina, daisy.bumstead – , accidental_artist3 – Ransom Candice, michzsimmons, Marian Said Rubin, Francesco Sambati, Jun Yamaguchi, Kathy Clay, David DeNagel, Albion Harrison-Naish, Qingxian Guo, Andy Alexandre, Damian De Souza, Catherine Caddigan, Yasuo Furue, Debara Splendorio, Susan Blase, Rita Colantonio, Barbara Braman, Clint Cline, Jilllian2 – Jill Lian, Laila, Linda Hollier, Peter Wilkin, Jane Schultz, Susan Rennie, p.a. hamel, Gianluca Ricoveri.

Mobile Photography & Art – Flickr/Instagram Group Showcase – 25 August 2019

2019-08-252019-08-25 by Joanne Carter

“Everything was calm. The sun was shining. I was swimming in the deep. And then, when I surfaced twenty years later, I discovered there was a storm, a whirlpool, a blasting gale lifting the waves over my head. At first I wasn’t sure I’d make it back to the boat and then I realised I didn’t want to make it back to the boat. Chaos is supposed to be what we most fear but I have come to believe it might be what we most want. If we don’t believe in the future we are planning, the house we are mortgaged to, the person who sleeps by our side, it is possible that a tempest (long lurking in the clouds) might bring us closer to how we want to be in the world…Life falls apart. We try to get a grip and hold it together. And then we realise we don’t want to hold it together.” The Cost of Living, by Deborah Levy a book I have been engrossed within this week. This was part of an autobiographical project by Levy, something she calls ‘a working autobiography‘, it’s a mediation on marriage, death and writing. Levy is a woman of our times, she confides in the reader, giving an account of her internal life, which to many, is so much more interesting than their external life. This is a book that hits hard and fast, in some ways, not so much a memoir as an eloquent manifesto or what Levy describes ‘a new way of living‘ and thus mobile photography and art, represents ‘a new way of seeing‘ and this is as clearly apparent in this weeks showcase as it is in the post-familial world. Enjoy!

Clarrise Debout, Eliza Badoiu, Aanca Balaj, Oola Cristina, @talesbytully – Tully Chant, @not218.808, Wemarriage_goddes – Bridget Robertson, @ja_graham, @rain.is.poetry, @after.1st.illumination – Jane Schultz, Manuela Matos Monteiro, Marshadraws – Marsha Estes, kmartist – Kathleen Magner Rios, elaineofyork – Elaine Taylor, john_nieto – John Nieto, cresting_wave – Paul Yan, eilisrealize – elis, @mariette_schrijver -Mariette Schrijver, filizakart – , @janisbrandenbury – Janis Brandenburg, cpatrickphoto – Cindy Patrick, emilio.nadales – Emilio Nadales, marian.rubin – Marian Rubin, aqua_libra – Max Lies …, Anne Highfield, Arko Rayhan, columnsovsleep, Charlie Little, Candice Railton, Karen Axelrad, Linda Hollier, Paul Toussaint, Oola Cristina, Jun Yamaguchi, Vadim Demjianov, Lorenka Campos, Albion Harrison-Naish, Sebastian Burczyk, Clint Cline, Salwa Afef, woltarise, Susan Rennie, Laura Peischl, Hanni K, Deborah Field, zananiro, Judy Wahlberg, Gianaluca Ricoveri, jilllian2 – Jill Lian, Barbara Braman, TheiPhoneArtGirl – Meri Walker, Rob Pearson-Wright, Sina, Tuba, p.a.hamel, Deborah McMillion, Jeremy Cassell, Rita Colantonio, Sergiy Beliayev, Catherine Caddigan.

Music this week is by one of my favourite British performers, Rhodes with his live track ‘Close Your Eyes’ at Burberry Menswear Spring/Summer Runway Show