Mitologías modernas: Ouka Leele & Co

The Sala Alcalá 31 of the Comunidad de Madrid hosts from 2 July to 18 October an exhibition that revisits the role of mythology in Madrid art of the 1980s, drawing on the work of Ouka Leele, alongside key artists such as El Hortelano, Ceesepe, Carlos Franco and Sigfrido Martin Begué.

Taking as its starting point Rapelle toi, Barbara!, the emblematic intervention carried out by Ouka Leele (Madrid, 1957–2022) at the Fuente de Cibeles in 1987, the exhibition explores how various artists linked to the Nueva Figuración and the Madrid Movida reclaimed classical mythology as a symbolic tool to interpret a new cultural reality during the Transición.

The exhibition brings together more than one hundred works by artists including Ouka Leele, El Hortelano, Ceesepe, Carlos Franco, Sigfrido Martín Begué, Guillermo Pérez Villalta, Dis Berlin, Pablo Sycet, Carlos Alcolea, Costus and Patricia Gadea, among others. Through paintings, photographs, drawings and pieces linked to new media and performances, the route sets up a dialogue between classical tradition, popular culture and contemporary experimentation.

The project analyses how these creators incorporated references from underground comics, fanzines, Romanticism and the history of art to construct new visual narratives about Madrid and its cultural transformation during the 1980s. In this exhibition, the work of Ouka Leele occupies a central place, connecting photography, painting and staging with the mythological imaginary.