Founder Artist
Cindy Patrick
As an artist, I've never been satisfied to simply freeze reality. I've always been much more interested in making images than taking photographs. My passion is for creating images that express how I feel about a subject rather than depicting the world around me in a purely representational way.
Cindy Patrick - NEM Founder Artist
Even in my early days as a photography student, I was always seeking ways to alter my photographs in some way. I would hand color my black & white photos or make Polaroid image and emulsion transfers and SX-70 prints. I remember discovering those toy cameras -- the Holga and the Diana -- and falling in love with the imperfections created by the plastic lenses and the light leaks. It was those imperfections that lent an air of mystery or a dreamlike quality to my images that was very appealing to me.
In the late nineties I discovered Photoshop, and that was a real turning point for me because I no longer had to wait hours for film to develop or days for my slides to come back from the lab before I could make an image. I could suddenly shoot a photo with my digital camera, bring it into Photoshop, and alter it in countless ways right there on my computer screen.
It wasn't until 2010 that I began using the iPhone as a creative tool, and I can't think of a more perfect marriage between my vision and my voice. With all the apps available to me, the iPhone is my toy camera, my photo oils, and my Photoshop all rolled into one and all on one device. I can now take photographs and make images within minutes, and in the palm of my hand. And since my iPhone is with me at all times, I can make images whenever the creative spark strikes with no waiting to get back to my computer or into my darkroom. For me, that is pure magic!
I have exhibited my work around the world, most notably in February 2012 at the Latitudes International Photography Festival in Huelva, Spain. There, I was one of only six iPhoneographers whose work was selected to be shown alongside that of many world-renowned photographers from the esteemed Magnum Photo Agency. My work has also been exhibited at The Lunchbox Gallery and the Wynnwood Exhibition Center in Miami, the Baton Rouge Gallery in Louisiana, Arthaus Gallery in San Francisco, the Los Angeles Center for Digital Art in Los Angeles, the Giorgi Gallery in Berkeley, and at the Los Angeles Mobile Arts Festival (LA-MAF) at the Santa Monica Art Studios in Santa Monica, California.
My work has been published on all the notable iPhoneography blogs and online publications including iPhoneography.com, iPhoneography Central, The App Whisperer, Life in LoFi, and iPhoneogenic, where I was named one of the 50 most promising, influential, creative, and encouraging mobile photographers/artists of 2011. In January 2012 I was named Second Runner-Up in the IPA Mobile Grant Award of 2011. In January 2013, I was a presenter at the annual Macworld/iWorld Conference in San Francisco where I gave a talk entitled, "The Fine Art of iPhoneography."
I am a contributor to two forthcoming books on iPhoneography: "Mobile Digital Art: Using the iPod and iPhone as Creative Tools" by David Scott Leibowitz, which will be published by Focal Press in February of 2013, and "The Art of iPhone Photography" by Bob Weil and Nicki Fitz-Gerald, which will be published by Rocky Nook and is available now for pre-order at Amazon.com. My work is also featured in "Mobile Masters - Crossing the Threshold" by Dan Marcolina, which is an iPad book available now through iTunes.
