Ouka Leele Biography

Ouka Leele is a Spanish photographer, painter, and poet. Born in Madrid into an artistic family, she learned photography at an early age, though she initially hoped to become a painter. In the late 1970s she joined post-Franco Madrid’s turbulent cultural scene, the movida madrilène; but had her first photographic show, Peluquería (Hair Salon)—figures bizarrely arranged with objects like turtles or electric razors ( Barcelona in 1979). In the 1980s she became famous for large, carefully organized monochrome photographs hand painted with watercolour and varnished. She applied this striking and sometimes disorientating technique both to everyday scenes and portraits and to elaborately staged fantasy pictures (e.g.

Dream of a Summer Night, 1986) reminiscent of Symbolism or Surrealism. Later she created more serene images, often including her daughter Maria.In one of her photographs called ‘The Diplomacy’, the photographer (Ouka Leele) has presented a bold atmosphere as the colours used contrast each other such as Green and Red. The subject matter of this image is not so Ouka Leele is a Spanish photographer, painter, and poet. Born in Madrid into an artistic family, she learned photography at an early age, though she initially hoped to become a painter. In the late 1970s she joined post-Franco Madrid’s turbulent cultural scene, the movida madrilène; but had her first photographic show, Peluquería (Hair Salon)—figures bizarrely arranged with objects like turtles or electric razors ( Barcelona in 1979). In the 1980s she became famous for large, carefully organized monochrome photographs hand painted with watercolour and varnished. She applied this striking and sometimes disorientating technique both to everyday scenes and portraits and to elaborately staged fantasy pictures (e.g. Dream of a Summer Night, 1986) reminiscent of Symbolism or Surrealism.

Later she created more serene images, often including her daughter Maria.In one of her photographs called ‘The Diplomacy’, the photographer (Ouka Leele) has presented a bold atmosphere as the colours used contrast each other such as Green and Red. The subject matter of this image is not so Ouka Leele is a Spanish photographer, painter, and poet. Born in Madrid into an artistic family, she learned photography at an early age, though she initially hoped to become a painter. In the late 1970s she joined post-Franco Madrid’s turbulent cultural scene, the movida madrilène; but had her first photographic show, Peluquería (Hair Salon)—figures bizarrely arranged with objects like turtles
or electric razors ( Barcelona in 1979). In the 1980s she became famous for large, carefully organized monochrome photographs hand painted with watercolour and varnished. She applied this striking and sometimes disorientating technique both to everyday scenes and portraits and to elaborately staged fantasy pictures (e.g. Dream of a Summer Night, 1986) reminiscent of Symbolism or Surrealism. Later she created more serene images, often including her daughter Maria.