laia abril

Laia Abril (1986) is a documentary photographer raised in Barcelona. Currently she is working as a staff photographer and Consultant Photo Editor at COLORS Magazine; combining with her freelance career and personal long-term project about Eating Disorders.

Her work has been published in several media as The Sunday Times Magazine, D Repubblica, Ojo de Pez, Le Monde, Ft Magazine, Burn Magazine, GUP, The British Journal of Photography, Esquire (Russia) or COLORS Magazine, where she is a member of the editorial team since she enrolled FABRICA - the Artist Residency of the Benetton Research Centre in Italy - in 2009.

After finishing her degree in Journalism and studied photography -including at the ICP in NY-, she decided to focus her photography in telling intimate stories which raises uneasy realities related with femininity. In 2009 and 2010 she was a finalist of the Ian Parry, participating in the exhibition at the Getty Gallery, in London both years, first with her project on the young lesbian community in Brooklyn, and then with 'Last Cabaret' about a sex club in Barcelona.

Her body of work has been exhibited and appraised mostly in Italy, Spain, Poland, London and New York. In 2010 she joined the agency Reportage by Getty as an emerging talent and was selected at Plat(t)form Winterthur PhotoMuseum 2012 in Switzerland.

Three years ago, she started a long-term project on Eating Disorders, with the First Chapter: 'A Bad day' a multimedia focused in the daily like of a young girl struggling with bulimia. The piece has been featured internationally on several media and selected at the NYPhotoFestival 2011, 3rd Lumix PhotoFestival, PhotoMeeting Ojo de Pez 2012, among others. In 2012 she releases her self-publish fanzine, 'Thinspiration', the Second Chapter of the Eating Disorder's series, which explores the use of photography in the Pro-Ana websites, highlighted as one of the best books of the year and exhibited in many festivals worldwide. The photographic project was also finalist at the Burn Emerging Photography Fun in 2012, shortlisted at FotoVisura Grant 2012 and selected as a jury choice award at Santa Fe Center 2012.

Currently she is working on her book project 'The Epilogue', the Third Chapter, which documents the aftermath from Eating Disorders fatal cases, on the indirect victims; patients' families and environments.