OSWEGO COUNTY – Nehir Onay is a Turkish filmmaker who moved to New York City to pursue her education and career aspirations in 2019, a century after Audrey Munson.
Audrey Munson is America’s first supermodel, the first actress who appeared nude in a major motion picture, and a women artists’ rights advocate who published a series of articles in newspapers 1920s under the title” Queen of the Artists’ Studio.” No wonder Nehir has run into many sculptures of Audrey Munson in NYC, such as atop the Municipal Building, MET Museum, Straus Park, and many more, during her thesis research for CCNY’s Film MFA program.
She was struck by Audrey, an artist who was ahead of her time and is long forgotten, now buried in Oswego. The filmmaker was in awe of how relevant some aspects of Audrey’s story are to today’s art and entertainment world and immediately started to research her life.
The names who contributed to the project include Andrea Geyer, a multi-disciplinary artist and the writer of the book “Queen of the Artists’ Studios” and Justin White, Oswego County historian.
Dear Audrey seeks to discover who Audrey Munson really was — an actress, muse, and writer who has been lost to history but whose image graces and investigates the human desire to be remembered and leave a mark in the world through arts. The documentary is held in a participatory manner, incorporating the filmmaker’s own experiences and emotional perspective on the subject into the film.
It is a combination of Audrey Munson’s own words and excerpts from her interviews. The film also features the only motion picture work of Audrey Munson that has survived until this day “Purity (1916)”, a piece that was considered scandalous at the time it was released. The journey eventually leads the young filmmaker to the re-discovery of her artistic identity.
Dear Audrey had a private screening during CCNY’s Citivisions Showcase and Jury members have described the film as “Dear Audrey is a beautifully meditated love letter that rescues from obscurity a woman who dared to push cultural boundaries. It uplifts and celebrates the contributions to New York City art, architecture, and culture; and seamlessly integrates a treasure trove of archives with the filmmaker’s first-person reflections.”
The film is currently in the festival round and will be available for public view in 2023.
