From cellphone Instagram photos to an Insta-gallery show

A recent show at a Santa Monica gallery gave people a chance to shed their workaday identities.

One minute, they were working to pay the rent while taking Instagram photos on their cellphones in their free time. The next, they were wearing name tags that said “ARTIST” and watching strangers examine those images on a gallery wall.

No one cared what they did in their everyday lives -- managing buildings, processing car loans, teaching class. They were stars of the show.

The event -- which was insta, lasting 4 hours -- was organized by Instacanvas, an online marketplace for Instagram art. The company reproduces photos on canvas, in framed prints, on cellphone cases.

The work they’d chosen to display came from all over the world. Some was straight photography -- without alteration. Other images practically had been painted by technology, as their creators used dozens of apps to transform the photos they had shot.

You can read all about this new world of photography in my latest City Beat story.

Keep reading to see a version of the story I sent out on Twitter, with photos of the scene at the gallery.

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<noscript>[<a href=”//storify.com/LATimescitybeat/from-instagram-to-insta-gallery-show” target=”_blank”>View the story “From Instagram to insta-gallery show” on Storify</a>]</noscript></div>

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