Van Leo (born Levon Alexander Boyadjian; November 20, 1921 – March 18, 2002) was an Armenian-Egyptian photographer who became known for his numerous self-portraits and portraits of celebrities of his time.

Jan 19, 2023 · Beginning in the late 1930s, Van Leo made hundreds of dazzling and uncanny self-portraits. What does his archive tell us about the mysteries of identity?

Van Leo, born Levon Boyadjian, is an Egyptian-Armenian photographer who worked from 1940 until 1970s. His photography is considered one of the pivotal stages of photography’s development in Egypt. Leo was born into a middle-class Armenian family who had moved to Cairo in the early 1880s.

Nov 5, 2023 · Becoming Van Leo is the first international survey of work by the late Armenian Egyptian photographer known as Van Leo, a pseudonym of his own making. Born Levon Boyadjian to Armenian parents in Turkey in 1921, the artist moved to Egypt with his family as a child, eventually settling in Cairo.

Van Leo, born Levon Boyodjian, elevated portrait photography to new heights by creating imagery that accentuated his subjects’ features through manipulation of lights and shadows.

Mar 17, 2022 · Responsible for some of the most cherished pictures of Cairo’s bustling cosmopolitan society in the 20th century, Van Leo has a remarkable portfolio. But who was the famed photographer and what legacy does he leave for Arab photographers today?

Mar 3, 2017 · Van Leo would never have called himself the Cindy Sherman of Egypt, but between 1939 and 1944, he took hundreds of untitled self-portraits, assuming myriad personae. In these, his own body was putty—he would grow his beard, shave his head, even put on weight, while experimenting with costumes, props, and lighting.

Becoming Van Leo is a study of the life and times of the late Armenian-Egyptian photographer. Born in 1921, Leon Boyadjian would come to be known as Van Leo, one of the most singular twentieth-century studio photographers in the Arab world.

Jan 26, 2022 · Born in Turkey in 1921 to Armenian parents who then fled the crumbling Ottoman empire, Van Leo (the pseudonym of Levon Boyadjian) grew up in Alexandria, Zagazig and Cairo. He was fascinated by...

Jul 10, 2024 · Van Leo, who worked from the 1940s until the 1970s in Egypt, was more than just a photographer; his lens did not merely record the surface, the world we see everyday. He was more interested in capturing the soul – the raw, unspoken emotions beneath.