Contact

Any enquiries or Commissions

studio@julimanara.com 

 

About

Juli Manara is a multidisciplinary artist working across photography, film, and installation. Her work explores the relationship between humans and the natural world, blending landscapes, botanical studies, portraiture, and symbolic figures into immersive, often fantastical compositions.

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Manara began photographing when she was only 15 years old, after receiving an analogue camera from her father. She did not know how to use it, so she studied the medium deeply, taking classes that led her through the entire analogue process. She describes this early engagement with photography — shooting, developing, and printing in the darkroom — as both magical and meditative. The physicality of the process, long before digital tools evolved, shaped her sensitivity to light, texture, and composition, qualities that remain central to her work.

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Her portraiture began with friends and those around her. At 23, her first work, documenting a Quilombola community in Bahia, Brazil, was commissioned by UNESCO for a magazine publication, and earned recognition at the Sony World Photography Awards. She later moved to Paris to continue her studies, a period during which she began merging portraiture with experimental, constructed imagery.

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Over time, as photography evolved into a digital medium, Manara embraced new technologies as tools to expand her practice. The new technology enables her to construct complex photographic montages by combining multiple independently captured images, subtly adjusting perspective, tone, and colour. The resulting works — which she calls “impossible pictures”  — exist somewhere between reality and imagination, inviting viewers into environments that feel both tangible and dreamlike.

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Nature remains central to her art process. From her upbringing near the Atlantic Forest in São Paulo to her life in the United Kingdom, she draws from tropical, temperate, and boreal landscapes. Her meticulous method involves building extensive archives of photographs, films, and sounds, which she later blends into new compositions that reimagine space and scale.

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Manara’s work has been collected and exhibited internationally at institutions including the Niterói Museum of Contemporary Art and Tate Modern. In 2023, her first short animation, crafted from recycled paper and photographic fragments, was selected as a finalist for the United Nations Sustainable Film Awards and projected at Piccadilly Circus. In 2025, she was invited to lead the Royal Academy of Arts' first photography short course and created for them a series of outdoor billboard works across London. Her collaboration with The Macallan, renowed wisky brand and recognised by their sustainable approach,  resulted in a large-scale forest triptych for the brand’s boutique at Heathrow International Airport.

 

Manara holds an MA from Goldsmiths University of London and has taught at Speos International Photography School. She currently lives and works between London and São Paulo, Brazil.

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Public Displays 

The Macallan Forest - Commissioned by The Macallan - Permanent Display at Heathrow Airport 

The Billboards - Commissioned by the Royal Academy of Arts - 2025 Across London
 

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Lecturers & Talks

The Royal Academy of Arts - Guest Lecture - London, UK

Belmond Design and Interiors Team + ArtiQ Agency - London, UK

De La Warr Pavilion Curators and Patrons - Embassy of Brazil in London
Speos International Photography School - Paris & London
PUC University - São Paulo, Brazil

Unicamp University - São Paulo, Brazil
 

 

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Exhibitions
2025 - Botanic Series Commission - The Macallan Boutique - London International Heathrow Airport 
2025 - The Billboards - Commissioned by the Royal Academy of Arts, Camden Market - London

2025 - Manacá - Solo Exhibition - Embassy of Brazil in London 

2025 - The National Gallery 200th Anniversary - Group Show  - Vaults of the National Gallery - London

2024 - Museum of Contemporary Art - Niterói - "Oh, I Love Brazilian Women!" - Rio de Janeiro

2023 - CCSP - Centre for Contemporary Art - "Oh, I Love Brazilian Women!" - São Paulo

2021 -  Apexart - "Oh, I Love Brazilian Women!" - New York

2020 - Tate Modern - Screen display for the opening of Dora Maar's Exhibition - London

2014 - Saatchi Gallery + Fritz Hansen Design at The Hyatt Hotel - London
2013 - National Library of France - Paris
2012 - NordArt Contemporary Art Fair - Hamburg

2012 - MIS - Museu de Imagem e Som - Group Exhibition - São Paulo
2012 - Somerset House - London Fashion Week - London

2010 - Palais de Chaiilot - Prix de la Jeune Creation - Paris, France

 

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Short Films Display​

2023 - PaperHeads - The Package Animation - Curzon Mayfair Cinema - London

2023 - PaperHeads - The Package Animation  - Piccadilly Circus Spotlights Screen - London

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Honours & Awards
2023 Big Syn International Film Festival Awards (United Nations) - London UK
2020 Screen display selection - Tate Modern - London UK 

2013 International Fine Art Photography Awards 

2012 LICC London International Creative Competition 

2011 Made Design Artist Awards 

2010 LPA London Photographic Association 

2010 Sony World Photography Awards 

2010 Prix de la Jeune Création Métiers d’Art  -  Winner - Photography - Paris, France 

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Selected Collections
The Macallan

Hiscox Art Collection
European Union Office, Brussels, Belgium

UBS Bank
Hyatt Group
National Library of France - Paris, France

 

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Bibliography 

Cover Image - Luso-Ecologies: Ecocritical Perspectives on Lusophone Arts and Literatures special issue for Portuguese Studies, edited by Dorothée Boulanger and Andrzej Stuart-Thompson vol. 41, n.1, 2025 - Oxford University

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Selected Publications
The Art Newspaper

Vogue 

The Culture Edit by Vogue

Financial Times 

How to Spend it

Smithsonian

The Glass Magazine

Widewalls

ArtRabbit

London Fashion Week

Saatchi Magazine
Art for Your World by WWF

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