Netherlands based Nico Brons is a freelance photographer and artist who currently studies at Amsterdam’s Photo Academy. Although he works with any number of different cameras he has an affinity for the iPhone and the immediacy of freedom he feels from mobile photography and art. His abstract and surrealist portraits of both real people and storefront mannequins are compelling and original. Nico’s work challenges the viewer and poses interesting questions about reality and fiction – what are we looking at? Is it real or fabricated, and does it even matter? Today, we feature his words, images and a short video showcasing Nico’s iPhone portraits.

I have a background in the IT business. In my early years I was consultant and teacher in CAD/CAM systems. Later, I was a System Administrator in Hewlett Packard UNIX systems. Now I am professional photographer in Amersfoort, the Netherlands and at this moment I am studying photography at the Photo Academy in Amsterdam. I always strive to take my photography to a higher level.

I am atracted to portraits because you can see a lot of emotions in a face. I make portraits of real people and I make portraits of mannequins. If I make images of real people it is for me very nice to meet them, to talk with them and to know something about them. When I meet people, it makes me socially richer and photography helps me with that.

When I make images of mannequins, for example in shops, I want to make them feel like they have come “alive”. Sometimes you see no difference with a real person when I finish the image. That is the challenge for me.

It is important for me to work on pictures of mannequins sometimes because I feel I can do what I want with them without hurting the feelings of a real subject.

Mannequins have no sense and no real heart. I can change the face, I can make it very scary, ugly or even beautiful. They never complain! I tend not to do that with real people because I respect the human being.

I love to create abstract and surrealist images. I am inspired, for example, by Salvador Dali, Rene Margritte, Giorgio De Chirico and James Ensor.

In the Netherlands I give workshops in mobile photography and that’s a great success.

Mobile photography / art gives me complete freedom in my creativity. It is not overly technical and the mobile phone camera is very easy to use and to carry. It has opened a complete new world for me and I am proud to be part of the community with many other very great iPhone artists. I make what I want for myself and it is, of course, very nice if others like my images too.

Beside portraits I love almost everything in photography. I can enjoy landscapes, streetphotography, architectural, pinhole, social photography and a lot more. But yes, I think that it is the complete freedom of the mobile, that’s the most important thing for me.

Nico Brons

You may see more of Nico’s work at his website, on Flickr and by viewing the video below.