By Catherine Fox

For the AJC

New technology is catnip to artists. Like the video camera and the computer before it, the cellphone has piqued their curiosity and creativity. As demonstrated by the works in Spruill Gallery’s “On the Flip Side,” artists are finding it a versatile tool.

Not surprisingly, its camera is the most widely exploited function, and the most prominent in the show. Photographers Lucinda Bunnen, Michael David Murphy and Shawn Rocco take advantage of its portability, ease of use and even its limitations in the work on display.

“It’s hard to be fast and loose with film,” Murphy said. “The phone takes all the seriousness out of the process, and the preciousness out of object.”

In other words, it gives him license to experiment. For instance, the Atlanta artist set the cellphone camera on a timer, mounted it on his car dashboard and went for a ride. The ensuing pictures of earth and sky become a careening amusement-park ride when strung together in the video “Cell Dash,” and a handsome abstract composition when turned into a large, gridded photo collage.

The camera also had a liberating effect on Rocco. The photojournalist for the Raleigh News & Observer started snapping pictures on this handy device as a way to take a break from professional concerns. Pursuing subjects of personal interest, he honed his eye and artistic vision, evident in the artfully composed and confident images here.

Rocco also used its immediacy and primitive machinery to good effect in the video “Cellular Obscura,” in which a fast-paced sequence of sometimes blurry images captures the energy of a political convention.

New York artist Jorge Colombo uses his cellphone to make “paintings,” two of which have appeared on the cover of The New Yorker magazine.

Call him a New-Age plein air painter: He stands on a street corner and fingerpaints the scene on his iPhone using a $4.99 application called Brushes, unencumbered by easel or even sketchbook.

Colombo has adapted his style to the application’s strengths, eschewing precise details for broad strokes and color layering, and harnessed them to eye and his compositional skills.

Rob Petit uses the object itself as a material for sculpture. The New York artist has arranged them into floor pieces, one in a corner in the manner of minimalist Carl Andre and another a tight spiral that suggests Richard Long.

Is he commenting about the phone’s ubiquity? Its prominence in landfills? Is he parodying his elders? The two pieces here seem a bit gimmicky, as if Petit is depending on the material to do his work for him.

Spruill Gallery director Hope Cohn, who organized the exhibition, includes a demonstration of an application designed by Georgia Tech professor Gil Weinberg, which turns the phone into a musical instrument and a device for writing musical compositions.

Although the cellphone is in its infancy as an art medium, it’s clearly got a running start. In the end, however, it’s just a tool like any other. The work that results will only be as good as the artists who use it.

Catherine Fox blogs about art and architecture at www.artscriticatl.com .

Exhibit previews

“On the Flip Side”

11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wednesdays-Saturdays. Through Nov. 7. Spruill Gallery. 4681 Ashford Dunwoody Road. 770-394-4019, www.spruillgallery.blogspot.com .

Thursday: Lecture by Jorge Colombo. 1:30 p.m. Visual Arts Building, Emory University. 700 Peavine Creek Drive. Also, artists reception at the gallery, 6-9 p.m.

The bottom line: An engaging introduction to the creative ways artists are using the cellphone.