Instagram story viewer> @natashanyanin> Posts

Natasha Nyanin

@natashanyanin

12.4K

followers

851

following

Writer. Visual Raconteur.
Believer in Beauty w/out Borders•Self-Styled Szymborska Scholar•Seeker of “THE ECSTATIC FLASH”•Vessel/Multitudes

POSTS STORIES REELS TAGGED

Celine Dion in Paris was phenomenal! I saw her in London a few years ago but this was unreal. An icon 🫶🏾🙌🏾Une force de la nature #Celinedion #celinedion #celinedionfans taken in Plenitude Arena by @natashanyanin

118

14

9 days ago

What 41 Feels Like…

…Like Tchiep and Yassa straight from blessed Senegalese hands in the Bronx to my little UWS “sweatbox” (as @ianolympio called it), paired with champagne, @curiouselixirs, a dose of dancing, laughter, and love.

… Like a playlist that travels from BSB to Angelique Kidjo via Marc Anthony and a taste of Tevin.

As one whose closest friends are scattered across a global home, I miss them most around this time of year— “Oh, I have made myself a tribe / out of my true affections, and my tribe is scattered!“ - Stanley Kunitz

Yet, the New York tribe continues to hold me down in the most beautiful of manners. Merci, mes amis near and far: you made this an NY night to remember and fitting cap to 41 years of roaming ✨. On to the next revolution of ridiculousness💫. taken in New York, New York by @natashanyanin

3

40

2 months ago

“SIT IN YOUR CELL AS IN PARADISE” - Saint Romuald

“And contemplating, I come to see, does not in any case mean closing your eyes so much as opening them, to the glory of everything around you. Coming to your senses by getting out of your head.”
- Pico Iyer

A week ago, I turned 41. A week before that, I chose to usher in the personal new annum by flying to Monterey from NYC, picking up as basic of a car as I could afford, and driving south to the New Camaldoli Benedictine Hermitage for 4 days to be spent in the splendour of silence.

I’d first heard the beautiful writer Pico Iyer speak of the hermitage south of Big Sur in one of his TED Talks; then I’d read his references to this place with which he had fallen in love (and his reference to the admonition written by an unknown 14th century monk in the book The Cloud of Unknowing: “by Love alone can God be caught and held, by thinking never”) in his book The Half-Known Life; and finally, I’d exchanged emails with Pico about the transformative power of silence when I decided I’d make the pilgrimage myself, fresh off the vicissitudes of a six-week Western European sojourn that saw me criss-crossing Italy and France in anything but quietude.

My breath was immediately abated as I began the drive from Monterey cutting through mist-clad mountain with the Pacific to my right justifying Keats’ description of “stout Cortez’s” reaction to the boundless body of water: “Silent, upon a peak in Darien”. I’d been told Big Sur was beautiful, but this was something else. And to see the sea, indistinguishable from the sky, sent me headfirst into a Szymborska poem:

“Dividing earth and sky
is not the right way
to think about this wholeness.
It only allows one to live
at a more precise address—
were I to be searched for
I’d be found much faster.
My distinguishing marks
are rapture and despair.”

Once at the hermitage, it was easy for me to ease into the eremitic lifestyle. No WiFi, no cell phone reception: just me and clouds that lay lower than me but blanketed the sea; just me and a handful of books to consult when I wasn’t napping, or simply breathing in mountain air with no agenda but to breathe… [caption cont’d in comments] taken in Big Sur, California by @natashanyanin

3

3

2 months ago

41.

I didn’t make these images today… or yesterday,.. not even last week. But I suppose I’ve been making this moment— writing these moments— my whole life. What was it that Octavio Paz asked in the preface to his book, The Double Flame? “When does a book begin to be written? How much time does it take to write?” I’ve been choreographing this moment — known and unbeknownst to me— (and all the moments grand or grotesque (or a bit of both) )since my first breath. Every detour on this labyrinthine dance of my life has culminated in this moment: the eternal now.

I actually made this images when a young Roman photographer with a buzz cut named Adele brought herself and her vision into the a tiny, unassuming (sarcasm, please) palazzo in Roma where I was lucky enough to be in June. Adele waltzed into the chaos of my world — broken zippers and cancelled Ubers a mere microcosm of the bigger and more substantial chaos in which I often reside — and did her own dance. So you see, I also didn’t make these images alone. These images are as much of Adele as they are of me. But there’s also Ms Anh, my seamstress, but more importantly big sister, of eleven years (who was one of the first people to send me a beautiful wish this morning) in there; there’s Julia Robert’s Vivian from the film Pretty Woman that I watched at far too young an age — and fantasies one forms before one knows one is forming them in there; there’s La Traviata’s Violetta and her flair for the dramatic hiding in my train ; in there somewhere is Giorgio, a hotel concierge who went as far as onto one knee to wrestle with a zipper; there’s my friend Grant (and every single true friend) who’s been the wind beneath my flights of fancy and anchored me when it matters. We don’t quite write life alone, do we? Even when we think we are, “no man is an island, entire of itself.” It’s 41 years of beautiful entanglements of flesh and circumstance that made these images.

But images is all they are.
[Caption Continued in Comments] taken in Roma, Italia by @natashanyanin

3

163

2 months ago

‘The real reason for Natasha Nyanin’s birthday celebration was to honor creativity, culture, and connection—to ignite an “ecstatic flash,” illuminating the channel to the divine within—and to give her guests a reason to travel. The theme was to ‘Unmask Venice,’—this literal world of bridges where past, present, and future converge, and fantasy and fact blur in a city emblematic of the twists and turns, the light and shadow of her life thus far. * Adapted from and here penned directly by @natashanyanin for @oprahdaily : ‘There were so many elements that needed to take shape, and how exactly they would come to be, I was not sure. But magical doors open when you step out in faith—and through the first of those doors danced, like a dervish of arabesques, the sprightly Florence-based calligrapher @bettysoldistudio , who understood my desire to infuse the moment with as much that was truly Venetian as possible and even suggested we write the place settings on Murano glass cutlery rests produced by Italian artist @vetrofusodanielapoletti . The historic Florentine stationery house @pineider immortalized Betty’s hand by impeccably printing all paper goods, from invitations down to dinner menus using an array of classical printing techniques. The deeper I dove into the yearlong process of planning Unmask Venice, the more kindred artists I serendipitously became connected with…’
@ata.de.cin @colbyblount @oprahdaily @venicevenicehotel 〰️ www.oprahdaily.com/life/a69410191/masked-ball-birthday-venice/ taken in Venice Venice Hotel by @natashanyanin

274

20

7 months ago

THE HIGH LIFE

Having just returned to NY after 4 days above the clouds in the silence and (austere) splendor of a hermitage in Big Sur, California, and given the magnificence of the drive that got me there, I’m thinking about the 5 days I spent driving through the Scottish Highlands a little over a year ago, a sojourn designed with the help of #VisitBritain and @traveltwo_

When I was reflecting on my Highland-hopping in Instagram Stories many moons ago— and specifically recalling the day we rode in Aberdeenshire in the rain, a dream in less than ideal weather — I wrote: I’ve long developed a certain degree of being able to hold tensions within myself and find beauty on the tightrope. For instance, the simultaneous disturbance of riding in the rain and the particularly delicious manner and measure of melancholy this sort of weather adds to a ride is a paradox that’s easy for me to instinctually inhabit: I’m simultaneously aware that the circumstances are not ideal and enamoured of texture the defiant weather adds to the day. But there comes a time, it would seem, when life leaves you lost in a wood, challenging everything you’ve ever known of yourself as an acrobat, begging you to surrender to silence and intelligence beyond the the dexterous but limited intellect. It’s a hell of a time, if I do say so myself. But I’m assured this time is the meat of the journey of life, a certain feast and famine all at once, and a time to “make room for becoming” through the acceptance of what is...

In conversation with Fr. Raniero at the Hermitage in Big Sur last week, we touched on this manner of tension but in different words. As he — far more eloquently than I could dream to — put it, the appearance of darkness, when we learn to hold the extremes in us all at once, no longer becomes an invitation to capitulate to the darkness, but instead a grace granting you the opportunity to stand in the beauty of your opposing truth. I can’t let a little rain ruin a thing for me; I can’t let stormy seasons — even as I weather them — cloud my vision of just how much I love and am grateful for this life… taken in Highlands, Scotland by @natashanyanin

3

4

2 months ago

DEPTH OF TIME / LENGTH OF CONNECTION
•
I’ve been in a season where time feels, on occasion, uncharacteristically shallow: one is connecting less to the present moment for innumerable reasons.

Imagine my elation to find that on this evening, on Christmas Eve, doing a thing I love — cooking and bringing together a few friends — was the anodyne the soul called for. For a brief expanse of time, time went on forever: “infinity in an hour,” to steal from William Blake. I was hardly even moved that my attempt at modifying my classic bûche de Noël to a tiramisu-inspired one ended in complete collapse. There was more than enough depth of time to go around…so much so that it was easy to forget for an instant that I’ve hardly known these people forever ✨

“I and the people I love may perish in the morning. I know that. But there’s light on our faces now.” - James Baldwin by @natashanyanin

3

15

9 months ago

PRACTICED POWERS and BELL TOWERS

This Christmas just passed, I wasn’t sure if I’d honour the years-long tradition of hosting an intimate dinner with a large bird: I wasn’t sure if fresh off about 5 months of itinerancy—having only arrived back in my apartment 5 days before Christmas— I had it in me. I was torn between the compulsion to create something beautiful (not just the ambiance or food— but, indeed, connection) while honouring a ritual and the reality of needing rest and being even more limited than usual in my already limited financial means while still battling a certain darkness of psyche. And my fridge had stopped working.

In the end my need to create won out: I needed to exercise the muscle. And, the beauty would prove to be much needed fuel for the outward journey, and light for the inward movement. I paired things back, accepting my limitation in energy, but determined to “take [my] practiced powers and stretch them out/ until they spanned the chasm between two/ contradictions” as Rilke wrote.

And what better occasion than this then to feature these candles created by @bettysoldistudio x @tamburrinisofficial, emblazoned with that ever illuminating couplet from Rilke:
“Let This Darkness be a bell tower, and you the bell”
“As you ring, what batters you becomes your strength”

And how ever could this simple but perfect table, with its yet-to-blossom tulips intertwining pillars of light, have come to be without @kingamojsa’s genius of a thumb? taken in New York, New York by @natashanyanin

3

7

9 months ago

Here’s To The LIMINAL SPACES…

Spaces dusted with all of our yesterdays…

And here’s to the spectral light that filters through…

Here’s to the imaginal cells for the butterfly, fuelled in the chrysalis—by broken-down larval tissue—to take shape, variegated and bright, and carry us to new heights…

Here’s to “Start[ing] to walk towards Shams. Your legs will get heavy
and tired. Then comes a moment
of feeling the wings you’ve grown,
lifting.” - Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī ✨ taken in Kolmanskop, Karas, Namibia by @natashanyanin

3

7

10 months ago

JOURNEY HOME

Peeking my head out after a bout of silence simply to say, it’s been an immensely disorienting number of months, a dizzying reality which left me no escape and the only way is through. But I’m here…

Here on the Journey Home to myself.

There are so many stories yet to share of the places life has taken me this year. And so much more grace and glory than I can ever recount but at least a million photos stored to attempt to delineate the sublimity. The outward movement has been a blessing. And yet the most profound of journeys — the Stygian one inward — is the one I’ll never be able to paint a fitting picture of. If you opened me up, you’d find a lot pain, but you’d find — like Agnes Varda said— all these landscapes too… The inward journey too has been a blessing.

“O and the night, the night, when the wind full of worldspace
gnaws at our faces—, for whom won’t the night be there,
desired, softly disappointing, setting hard tasks
for the single heart.” - Rainer Maria Rilke

Who knows how long the night?

“The time my journey takes is long and the way of it long…
The traveller has to knock at every alien door to come to his own, and one has to wander through all the outer worlds to reach the innermost shrine at the end.

My eyes strayed far and wide before I shut them
and said ‘Here art thou!’

The question and the cry ‘Oh, where?’ melt into tears of a thousand streams and deluge the world with the flood of the assurance: I am!” -Rabindranath Tagore

I am. by @natashanyanin

3

8

10 months ago

A milestone birthday might have been the impetus for dragging 30-odd friends to Venice for a series of experiences that culminated in a black-tie masked ball at the Venice Venice Hotel. But Natasha Nyanin’s real reason for the celebration was to honor creativity, culture, and connection. Tap the link in our bio to read more of @natashanyanin’s story. (Credit: @ata.de.cin) by @natashanyanin

4k

110

a year ago

“Celebration is when we let joy make itself out of our love.” - Thomas Merton

I am thrilled to have written an essay for @oprah/ @oprahdaily’s Holiday 2025 issue about the folly and feat, the magic and the mayhem of celebrating my 40th birthday in Venice. LINK IN BIO ✨

The story is brought to life by @ata.de.cin’s eye and sanguine photography. Ata, thank you for “seeing” the moments, but most of all for seeing my heart, not just in Venice, but in all the twists and turns after our meeting. I am so grateful for you.

Thank you to my editor @pilar_guzman for spinning sense out of my long-windedness, and to Paulie Dibner and to the entire Oprah Daily team for the work you do. Thank you, @thomasrbell for being first eyes on this piece when I was too blinded by grief to see clearly. And to every hand that raised this dream, a year in the making, into reality, not least of all @bettysoldistudio, @kingamojsa, @ianolympio, and @colbyblount: I am eternally grateful.

I’m stubborn when I have a vision, sometimes pushing a bit too far in the name of love. At 40, I’m still learning the hard lesson of balance. Venice was a lesson in that acrobatic art, as well as a lesson in love. I’m thankful for the room to grow, and the room to write my words, or rather to be the conduit of words. Onward 💫

“I have finally concluded, maybe that is what life is about: there’s a lot of despair, but also the odd moment of beauty, where time is no longer the same... an always within never.” - Muriel Barbery, The Elegance of The Hedgehog by @natashanyanin

3

90

a year ago