Miss Aniela Photography

My exhibition ‘Self gazing’ opened on Thursday night (17th April) at Camara Oscura in Madrid.

The publicity for the event was excellent; there has been coverage by El Pais, Yo Dona (in El Mundo), and I was interviewed by two TV channels - one, La 2 Noticias, which aired on Wednesday night (16th) on TVE2, and the other which will be Antena 3 at some point. As soon as I can find out how to show these interviews on the internet I will post the links in a blog entry, along with some candid pics and a bit of reflection on the experience.

The press coverage has served to bring my Flickr photostream an aggregation of 100,000 views in only three days, and my website views have quadrupled this week. On Wednesday, my feature in El Pais brought 3000 unique visitors to my site (the usual is an average of 400!)
However, each press feature has varying degrees of what some viewers have interestingly highlighted as a misrepresentation of my work. I’ll leave that to the individual to decide. I just find it very interesting how one’s interpretation of my images, the focus they put on detailing the ‘nudity’ and if indeed they emphasise the notion of ‘nudity’ (my strongest supporters/friends don’t seem to identify categories across my work according to the amount of clothing I wear) says more about that person, that journalist, than necessarily me. This can be applied to the work of any ‘artist’, female self portrait artists I think in particular. Perhaps.

Anyway, here are images from the evening! All images taken by my Mr Lovely. Thank him for the excellent shots!

Above: ‘Self-gazing!’

Above: excitement building..? or something!

Above: The visitors on the evening

Above: To my right - Teresa Lugo (from the gallery), and her friends

Above: Teresa again (on the right)

Above: By ‘The Chase’

Above: By ‘The deaths’ with a journalist from art mag LaPiz

Above: a viewer…

Above: Ligeia Scabbia (Eva) and Patricia Ossietta from Flickr! We all met for the first time that evening!

Above: me with Eva and Patricia!

Above: unruly bra strap. i signed two autographs - autographs! haha.

Above: looking on at Sea View…

Viewers by ‘Stretch’.

Above: poser shot by ‘South by southeast’ (my fave print of the exhib)

Above: Camara Oscura Director Juan Curto and journalist from LaPiz.

Above: wine, people, ‘Memoirs of a woman of leisure’

Above: Visitors

Above: and… had to share this funny random shot!

Thanks to all those who came along, and if you live in Madrid or are visiting, the exhibition is open until 31st May, so come and visit. Prints are available in editions of five and if you are interested get in touch with the gallery or myself to find out more. The exhibition has only been open a day and already has sold work. Pretty good going!

The article in El Pais! (see online here).

Some viewers told me that they disliked this article. I’ll discuss it in my next post when I also share some pics of the exhibition launch from Thursday night. For now I’d like you to make your mind up for yourself. Is this article a misrepresentation of ‘Miss Aniela’?

Translation (below) thanks to Eva (title quoted from Patricia Ossietta’s translation)

—-
“Photographic Self-Eroticism”

“A British artist’s success in the net posting intimate self-portraits.”

Beatriz Portinari - Madrid.

“Like other music bands and artists, her fame was born in Internet, via her Flickr-page, where millions of potential admirers share photographs. The enigmatic name Miss Aniela (www.flickr.com/photos/ndybisz/) had everything to become successful on the Net: she was a lolita who got naked in front of of her camera, with a sexy pose and flash, a bit of Photoshop, oniric light, clones … and the internet users at her feet.

“Her images made clear pictoric references to Balthus, sometimes even as a cinematographic recreation reinvented by herself. There is the excited woman on the coach, the relaxed and naked on the sofa, another one without clothes and in front of the window or cloned among the rocks. Behind the 477 photographes, seen by three million people since she opened her webpage two years ago, hides the British student Natalie Dybisz (Leeds, 1986), who opens tomorrow Self-gazing, her first exposition in Spain.

“In spite of the polemic her images usually provoke, criticised by feminist movements, Miss Aniela assures that each photograph has a reivindicative message, started in her youth with tricks of photos where she appeared kissing herself. “In that moment I started to read feminist literature and I wanted to express a certain kind of self-erotism, associated to what I felt in those moment. I wanted to celebrate being with myself”, explains the young woman, accused by some sectors of being narcissistic and by others of being pornographic and exhibitionist. The thing that started as a online diary where she wrote her thoughts with her daylife images became a more risky and daring work, with the danger of being censored loads of times, in the one where the illumination and the scenification are her allies. After participating in the collective exposition ‘How we are now’ last year in Tate Britain in London and becoming a reference of the main trend publications, Miss Aniela assures she wants to continue with her photographic nudism: “Everything comes from my passion to create powerfull and intriguing images, using the first model I have closer. So, why should I do something different now?”

“Self -gazing. From tomorrow in the gallery Camara Oscura. Alameda,16. Till 31st May.”

I said I’d upload any publicity from the upcoming exhibition that I can get my hands on, so here is some..

This article was in Yo Dona magazine inside a well known Spanish newspaper yesterday. Published as an ‘exclusive’, they used a previously unpublished pic, At White Rock, as the main image.

To see bigger, click here. Oh no - not showing up big at all. I’ll get Delarge to help out with a onsite version ASAP…

Here is a translation (only for amusement really, at the misquotations and slight misinformation regarding Tate Modern - it was actually Tate Britain, and my inclusion in the exhib was due to a Flickr competition, I didn’t exactly have my own exhibit!)

“MISS ANIELA
Portrait of a lady 2.0.

“She started showing her photographs in internet and inmediately she jumped to the first row. Now this young british launches her controversial work in our country. By Sandra F. Molina.

“There is a reserve of young artists prepared to follow the Young British Artists that Saatchi sponsored in the 90s. In that situation is placed Natalie Dybisz, coming from Leeds and just hit her twenties, who one day decided to change her diary written with ink for a digital camera and upload her self-portraits in internet. Suddenly, she became an artist. ‘People liked my work, they said I had a own-style and they wanted to interview me. But that wasn’t my plan. I didn’t even study photography! 12 months after uploading my first self-portrait I did my first exposition’. It was on Flickr, the photography - interchange online community, a new example of the future navegation web 2.0. which is used by 25 million people everyday. On the net, Miss Aniela (pronounced Ann-yella). ‘Everyone needs to be protected by an alter-ego’, she argues. ‘On the right hand, I wanted to pay tribute to my polish origins and, on the other hand, I wanted to use the Miss label. It was a way to represent myself as a single and independent woman, young and feminine’.

“In her self portraits, she uses narcissist dreams to clone herself continuously and exaggerate the sensuality and the erotsim, a style that has made her one of the most controversial photographer on the internet. Because there are no few people that have brand her work as pornographic. “The fact that people don’t still assume that the image of a nude woman doesn’t mean sex makes me angry, it doesn’t have negative connotations nor has to become a part of masculine fantasies. With my shots I try to express my sexuality, but no with the presence of a spectator but as an active desire entity, with my rights. What I am.” The work of Miss Aniela has opened an interesting debate about the female nudity and its place in art history.

“The references to Cindy Sherman’s work are obvious, but Natalie feels overwhelmed with that comparison. “My work is less obvious , I am not able to parody with so much style as she did. But I agree with the ideology of her images.” With such a direct speech, its not weird that Natalie has reached the recognition short time. Last year, the London Tate Modern opened its doors to her work, in a retrospective about the new photography, and now she comes to Madrid to show her work in Self-gazing, a exposition she defines as “An opportunity to show the diversity of my style, to show my my most risky side and, at the same time, most sensual”. But this is another step more in the World Domination Plan of Miss Aniela.

“Self-Gazing can be seen from 17th april till 31st May in Cámara Oscura Gallery, Madrid. (More info: www.camaraoscura.net)”

(front and back of invitation:)

My exhibition launches at 8pm at Camara Oscura Galeria de Arte, C/Alameda 16, Madrid (near Atocha metro). I’ll be there to sign autographs for everyone… joke.

If you want an invitation just drop a comment here or mail me. I’m not sure yet whether you need an invitation to get in. I’ll find out.

To see the images that will be in the exhib, click here.

Definitely won’t be buying one of those Easyjet bacon baps for breakfast on the plane like I did last time. Eurgh…

And by the way, I speak zilch Spanish. Even Hola fails to come out properly

These are the nine images that will be exhibited at camara oscura galeria de arte, Madrid, from 17th April to 31st May 2008.

Not long to go!

The images are, from left to right starting with top row and going down:

An impromptu performance (2008)
The chase (2007)
Sea view (2007)
Girl dreaming (2007)
South by southeast (2007)
On the rocks (2007)
Memoirs of a woman of leisure (2006)
The deaths (2006)
Stretch (2006)

Camara oscura is in Atocha, the gallery district of Madrid, not far from the major museums.

My work, including the nine images on display, will be available in limited editions of five, printed on the finest quality archival paper with Epson Giclee inks, (at 23 x 34.5 inches for normal portrait/landscape dimensions, and 23 x 23 for square images).

The nine exhibition prints on display are coated in archival UV coating and framed with a natural matt colour aluminium frame.

I’ll keep the blog updated with any exciting press coverage (fingers crossed) and more info!