Friday, July 21, 2017

Natalia Vodianova Joins PicsArt as Head of Aspiration

Supermodel and philanthropist to bring purposeful inspiration to the world’s largest digital creative community 

SAN FRANCISCO-Thursday, July 20th 2017 [ ME NewsWire ]
(BUSINESS WIRE)-- PicsArt, the leading image editing app and creative social network, today announced the appointment of Natalia Vodianova, the supermodel and philanthropist, as Head of Aspiration. In this new role, Natalia will inspire and suggest opportunities to drive positive change through creativity. She has also joined the company’s advisory board.
“We are thrilled to welcome a talent and role model like Natalia into our family,” said PicsArt CEO Hovhannes Avoyan. “Natalia has been deeply involved in bringing creative inspiration to the world through fashion and social commitment. She’ll help connect the fashion world and the brands and charities she works with to our creative community of 90 million monthly active users, for remixing and inspiration.”
“I’m excited to be part of a community where social sharing finally meets real engagement. PicsArt users collectively contribute millions of images a day, in a true celebration of love and colors that goes well beyond scrolling and liking. I see in it the power to ignite concrete change and bring visibility to very important causes,” said Natalia Vodianova. “I’m joining PicsArt because I believe people are capable of the most amazing things when they have full freedom and creativity in their hands and a purpose to apply them to. When users become aware of their collaborative power, engagement grows naturally.”
The role is a direct extension of Natalia’s focus on social activism and her vision of creativity, which naturally meets PicsArt’s mission of making awesome pictures to make the world a better place. In fact, Natalia sees creativity as a powerful, collaborative tool to activate people around social causes, in a fun, light and engaging way. Over the last five years, Natalia has established herself as a tech-entrepreneur by founding Elbi, a digital platform that puts creativity to the support of many different charity causes, fundraising for them and rewarding users for their activity. She will bring her strong purposeful storytelling and vision to PicsArt to inspire over 400 million people globally, who have already downloaded PicsArt, plus new users, to participate in creative programs for social good.
Late last year, Natalia helped normalize breastfeeding through her participation in the viral #TreeOfLife phenomenon that swept the Internet, fueled by PicsArt. She, along with tens of thousands of mothers globally, turned breastfeeding photos into works of art and shared them socially.
Starting today, Natalia can be followed via her PicsArt profile, picsart.com/natasupernova, where she’ll be challenging fans and the PicsArt community to be more creative. To begin, Natalia is offering access to inspirational stickers on her PicsArt profile that are free to use and edit, plus contests and challenges that are free to enter, available to everyone globally.
About PicsArt
PicsArt is the leading image editing app and creative social network. PicsArt makes it easy to step up your photo editing game, Remix pictures with friends, make stickers and share your creations with the world. It’s the one free app that lets you be truly creative with its 3000+ editing features, special effects, and nearly 10 million #freetoedit images. PicsArt has over 1 million #freetoedit community stickers, making it one of the largest open-source repositories of content in the world. With more than 400 million installs and 90 million monthly active users, PicsArt spans the globe and is available in 20 languages. PicsArt is free on iOS, Android and Windows devices. Download the app now or visit www.picsart.com for more information.
About Natalia Vodianova
Natalia Vodianova has walked hundreds of runway shows, starred in some of the most famous campaigns for top luxury and fashion brands, such as H&M, Prada, Calvin Klein, Louis Vuitton, Chanel, Gucci, and David Yurman. Nicknamed “Supernova” by her industry, Natalia is one of the most iconic supermodels over the last fifteen years and a loving hands-on mother of five children. She also established herself as a truly inspiring and active heroine of philanthropy: her charity organization, the Naked Heart Foundation, founded in 2004 by Vodianova, works to tackle the stigma of disability and ensure that every child has a loving family and a stimulating place to play. With the launch of her digital platform Elbi, she made philanthropy part of everybody's day life: empowering others to fundraise for charitable purposes, all while spreading the philosophy that every little act of love counts. She is also a board member of the Special Olympics International and an ambassador. She’s brought her philanthropic vision at many prestigious events, including the Clinton Global Initiative, Global Citizen, First Ladies’ Luncheon, Web Summit, Founders Forum, Millennial Summit, and One Young World.

Contacts
PicsArt
Jeff Roberto
press@picsart.com
or
Natalia Vodianova
Timon Afinsky
timon@elbi.com