Grammy Nominated Producer
Curiosity has always been the driving force behind anything I do.
Italian born music producer and photographer, Alex Elena has built an illustrious
career over 30 years. He began touring as a drummer for Bruce Dickinson (Iron
Maiden) at age 17 and then played on Avril Lavigne’s multi-platinum debut album
“Let Go” as well as records by Belinda Carlisle, Adam Holzman and Brave New
World (Miles Davis), to name a few. After collaborating with Tarka Cordell (son of
legendary producer, Danny Cordell), Alex moved into music production, honing an
unconventional approach while producing successful artists such as Lily Allen, Evan
Dando, Citizen Cope and Michelle Shaprow. This transition eventually culminated in
Alice Smith’s “FOR LOVERS, DREAMERS, AND ME” album, which Alex produced,
co-wrote and played most of the instruments on, that landed a GRAMMY nomination
in 2008 for the song “Dream”. Alex’s work evolved to include photography in 2009
when he left for the jungle of the Darien Gap in Panama with the idea of taking
portraits of never-before photographed indigenous tribes. Since then, he’s
photographed a range of subjects spanning the globe: from the streets of Kenya to
everyday life in The Gambia and Cuba to the aftermath of the war in the former
Yugoslavia. As a result of these experiences, Alex’s work has been featured in
exhibits for the Leica Gallery (Los Angeles), the National Gallery of Bosnia and
Herzegovina, the Torrance Art Museum, the REEF/LA Mart, and Berlin Art Week as
well as publications such as Vogue, The New York Times, The Daily Mail, La
Republica, and Vanity Fair.
Grammy Nominated Producer // Photographer
alex-elena.com