Over the course of the past several years, each and every one of us have become amateur photographers. From the adequate cameras on our smartphones to apps like Instagram and Snapchat, suddenly every moment in our lives can be captured with a single button press. Unfortunately, a vast majority of those photos are fleeting snapshots of meals or beach trips, but professional photographer Kat Sloma has decided to convert to full-time “smartphone photography” to prove that the iPhone is a viable medium for art.
Some of Sloma’s work falls in the realm of traditional photography, but other photos are almost unrecognizable after she begins to edit them with the various apps she has on her phone.
“It’s fundamentally photography because I start with a photographed image,” Sloma said while speaking with the Statesman Journal. “The beauty of the iPhone is it sizes everything down to what I love: composition and processing.”
“You basically have a 35 mm lens, no zoom,” she continued. “Taking all the choice and complexity out, you have to work with what you have … By working with limitations your creativity is freed. You don’t get paralyzed by choices. You respond to what is there with the tool you have.”
Her work, on display at the Salem Art Fair & Festival, received plenty of praise from the jurors, who went on to name her one of two “emerging artists” in attendance.
To see more of Sloma’s work, check out her website at KatEyeStudio.com.
