Art of Conversation

The cell phone becomes a canvas

December 21, 2005—Bay Area entrepreneur John Doffing has artistic ambitions for the cell phone in your pocket. "When I started seeing the content that was being sold on the Web—blurry clip art of girls in bikinis and Jamster.com making millions off those singing frogs—I realized there was an enormous opportunity here," he says. So last week the founder of SF’s START SOMA gallery launched startmobile.net, the first site to let people download works of art directly to their cell phone. “You can use them as screen savers, or have them set to ringers for each of your friends,” he says, “I think this could really change how art is appreciated and owned." It’ll certainly make it cheaper and more accessible—each piece is only $1.99, and there are thousands available, including work by legendary street artists Vulcan (top left) and Shepard Fairey (top center), as well as photographers Ben Watts (top right) and Ernie Paniccioli. According to Doffing, things are off to a flying start—artists in Europe have already had patrons call offering fine-art commissions, and the service will soon begin providing artworks created just for mobile phones. “I honestly don't know what mobile art is going to look like,” he says, “but it's exciting." And, of course, potentially lucrative.
www.startmobile.net