Photos Credited To PR
As part of Voir’s Wardrobe Series, Audrey Nuna (who styles all her own music videos, FYI) gave us an insight into what exactly goes on behind her closet doors. We also spoke to the 22-year-old artist about her new single ‘Space’, her love of Kanye and the PowerPoint presentation that persuaded her parents to let her pursue music.
Audrey Nuna still finds it odd that people actually listen to her music. “Every release gets better and more overwhelming for me,” she tells us. “Sometimes I look at Spotify and see all the people listening and I’m like, ‘Who are you? What are you doing?’” She laughs. To press play on Nuna’s new single ‘Space’ will give you a good idea of why people love her, if you’re not already a seasoned listener. ‘Space’ was released on April 2nd, which also happened to be Audrey Nuna’s 22nd birthday – a grand way to celebrate, you might say. Nuna also spent the day hanging out with her mother and eating sushi, which is an annual birthday ritual.
“My visuals are pretty much of vomit of things I see in my everyday life”
‘Space’ came alongside a funky new video, which we were keen to hear more about given that it explores a multitude of themes. The video begins with a child playing a video game, in which the character is Audrey herself; who proceeds to take a very ceremonial dunk in a swimming pool before various other well-dressed antics unfold. Audrey tells us she is always involved in the process of creating visuals for her music from the get-go, and usually this process involves friends of hers. “It was my friend Loris [Russier] who directed the video. We just sit down and think of the craziest ideas we can,” she explains. “I think about the video while I’m writing a lot of the time, so the underwater scene was something I knew I wanted. I’ve always wanted to walk on water.” She laughs. After establishing this, she and Russier brainstormed other concepts that represented the idea of space and being alone. “I thought it was really interesting, the thought of a modern day Rapunzel,” she tells us of the scenes where meters of braids follow Audrey around the monumental building in which the video takes place. “My visuals are pretty much a vomit of things I see in my everyday life and how I interpret them.”
Unlike a lot of artists, and as we have established from the ’Space’ video, Nuna rarely speaks literally when it comes to getting her desired message across. She enjoys writing from character standpoints, largely because of her love of reading fiction. “My life is pretty interesting but there’s a world out there full of crazy people and things,” she says. “I’ve written a song about somebody killing their partner and their mistress before. I’ve obviously never done that – but I think the sentiment of betrayal is something we can all relate to.” Essentially, the songs and visuals she produces are grandiose, dramatised recollections of real-life happenings; she is a storyteller.
Whilst Nuna’s parents were supportive of her interest music, it took a bit of persuading to get them onboard with her taking a gap year from her studies at NYU to pursue her own projects. “Even though I was there on a scholarship, I saved for college for my whole life and within a year it was gone,” she says. “I was taking a train uptown, a bus and an Uber to get to the studio almost every single day. I’d get back at 5am and be late for class. I was half-assing both things and I wanted to full-ass one.” She laughs. So, she put her head down and created a masterpiece that convinced her traditional-minded father that a gap year was the way forward. Nuna’s creative “cute fonts and pie charts” were enough for her to get her way, on the condition that she returned a college after the year. Needless to say, she didn’t.
Considering that she has nearly 100,000 monthly listeners on Spotify and more exciting releases coming this year, it’s safe to assume that Nuna’s decision to leave college has been accepted as the right one by the people around her. Her mother tells her that when she was younger, Audrey used to sing “when she ate something yummy”, and whilst nobody else in the family has musical roots, her own interest was clear from the beginning. Nuna’s sophomore year in high school coincided with the release of Kanye West’s ‘Yeezus’, an album that captivated her from the first listen. “I was intrigued by the album cover. Who thought to put a picture of a CD as an album cover? I thought it was genius,” she says. “I listened out of curiosity and was shocked by the vulgarity and the harshness of it, but it was so exciting.” There, Audrey’s love of rap music was born, and whilst she never made a conscious decision to become a rap artist herself, she tells us that spoken word just feels right for certain songs.
“It’s funny when people say [I dress well] because I grew up with people telling me that I dressed really weird”
A huge part of Audrey Nuna’s presence as an artist is her personal style. The ‘Space’ video was styled by herself, and her Instagram (@audreynuna) is awash with jazzy outfits and bold accessories. When we tell her this, she laughs. “It’s funny when people say that because I grew up with people telling me that I dressed really weird.” Nuna’s father works in clothing manufacturing, so she grew up surrounded by fabric and credits her interest in fashion to this. “My style really developed when I went to New York City, I grew up in the suburbs and everyone dressed the same,” she says. “But when I went to college in the city I realised you can literally wear anything you want.” An eye-opening realisation that was for Audrey, who now describes her style as “futuristic grandpa”.
“I was emotionally exhausted and don’t think I would have taken that break if it weren’t for the pandemic”
Nuna took the pandemic as a welcome break following an intense period of writing and creating. “I had all these amazing songs and felt so good about them, but I was also emotionally exhausted and don’t think I would have taken that break if it weren’t for the pandemic.” She explains. She rekindled her love of reading during the pandemic by joining a book club (she recommends a book called Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents by Isabel Wilkerson as required reading), she started watching more films and even experimented with cooking (the latter didn’t go so well). “I just tried other creative outlets. I started taking more walks, riding my bike more, trying to see the silver linings.” It sounds as if this well-earned break was more than beneficial for Audrey, as she teases another new release coming up soon. She describes putting out new music as “throwing a piece of her soul into the universe”, and while we’re still on a ‘Space’ high here at Voir, we can’t wait to see what Nuna comes out with next.
Interview And Words By Pippa Simmonds, Graphic By Millie Pollok
