QUEEN OF WAVES
“There’s this beautiful parallel between mother nature and the female body. So, that’s something I try to highlight in an elegant way.”
From collaborating with Playboy to featuring in Christie’s web3 exhibit, Ayla El-Moussa’s journey to becoming a digital artist has been written in the stars. “I started creating digital art in 2016. My focus is on moving art, and I knew that’s where my arena would be,” she shares.
She describes her art as a “Visual Philosophy combining the power of Self Portrait photography & film to capture the essence of nature & the female form.” Ayla is dubbed the ‘Queen of Waves’ for the way she incorporates the movement and the power of water into her pieces.
After struggling to gain recognition via Instagram, web3 posed as the perfect platform; ‘it was a beautiful symbiotic marriage,” Ayla explains. If you come across some of her artworks such as ‘Reflection of Self’ and ‘Woman on Rock,’ it’s easy to see why the NFT community welcomed her with open arms. The reception in the NFT space was refreshing, she says: “For the first time, I realized digital artists now have a place in the world of art.”
An advocate for nude neighborhood, her pieces showcase a seamless and majestic cohesion between nature and the human body – with a healthy dose of moving imagery. “I shoot primarily nude because we all entered this world nude and usually leave it nude. There’s this beautiful parallel between mother nature and the female body. So, that’s something I try to highlight in an elegant way.”
Ayla’s latest project – including multiple pieces – was the ‘Century’ series. Her use of grainy effects and distinct colors makes for excellent viewing. “That was all shot in the hillsides of Yorkshire in England. It wasn’t planned. We were literally driving in Yorkshire for a holiday with my family and then I’d make us stop because a field looked really cool.” Always an artist.
Born and raised on Vancouver Island, Canada, most of her shoots are somewhere in California. “That’s where I did my genesis collection. ‘Body Scape’ was shot in Death Valley and the sand dunes. There’s also Joshua Tree and other beautiful places in Arizona that I go to,” she says.
Her use of moving imagery creates a meditative and mesmerizing experience. It’s as if the art has come to life.
