On an out-of-town trip in 2007, Joel Grey found himself in a small St. Lucie, Florida museum, filled with bizarre and eminently photographable objects. Feeling, as he had with the images that became 2003's Pictures I Had to Take, compelled to capture these provocative tableaux, but without his trusty Nikon Nikkormat by his side, Grey did the next-best thing he could--he reached for his cell phone.
Grey had never had any use for the camera function of his Nokia 133 before, and was skeptical about the capabilities of its tiny 1.3-megapixel lens. But to his surprise, the same familiar perspective he'd always had when taking photographs was still there; even without a viewfinder, he could make the kinds of pictures he had always loved to make. The limitations of the format--the inability to control the aperture stop, focus, or any of the other variables of traditional photography besides framing--proved a thrilling new challenge, which Grey likens to "collaborating with a power larger than yourself." Grey spent the next eight months shooting with his phone, and the result is 1.3: Images from My Phone, a collection of slices cut from diverse visual worlds: street art and still life, advertising and architecture, shadows and reflections, natural beauty and urban grit.
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