Meet Daniel Leka | Creative Storyteller

We had the good fortune of connecting with Daniel Leka and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Daniel, is your business focused on helping the community? If so, how?
In my opinion, with the way the world has shaped and conditioned us, we’ve been taught essentially that our stories seldom matter. The reason why I’ve come to this conclusion is because back in 2019, I lost my father to colon cancer. This incident happened on Friday, May 10 and before I knew it, I was back in school on Tuesday, May 14, handing in assignments and continuing to be “Daniel Leka,” someone who meant everything and nothing altogether. And as time passed, I came to realize that the community that existed around my father began to fill in the holes that his death had left, almost making it seem as though nothing had happened. Although I knew the loss had affected so many people close to myself and my family, we ultimately moved on, because our nature as humans is to always continue forward and always strive for better. Yet, when this happened, I couldn’t help but notice that I felt this obligation to continue on my father’s legacy and carry his story with me. This meant that everything I committed to was twofold in expectations: not only was I committing for my sake but for my Father and family’s sake.

All of this is to say that my father was one of billions of people that inhabited this Earth at one point or another. So while his story means little to the greater world, it means everything to me. This realization has allowed me to understand the importance of everyone’s story and how my life’s desire revolves around this idea of storytelling. The only consistency that has allowed people to continue onward on this perilous journey towards automation is the power of story. The ability to depict things in an honest light is important for the grander community because our existence continues to be driven towards binary classifications. Therefore, depicting something in the grey abyss that we exist in is why my “business” is important and helps the community and world. I consider my business a database that I am cultivating, simply because it exists for the sake of informing the general public of the people they share this planet with. My goal is to articulate the plight of the youth in this moment because they have the power to change their circumstance more than any other generation currently. This is what 20 Year Crisis means to me and the social impact I strive for is timely and timeless in its essence. Yet, altogether, I aim to inform the people of who their fellow humans are and how we can ultimately coexist together, seldom times infringing upon one’s right to exist in this world.

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
Regarding the type of art I make, I feel as though it would be disingenuous to the creations if I was to explain exactly what they consist of. I can tell you that I dabble in multiple visual and auditory mediums and am looking towards other that will help accent my vision purposefully. But regarding the art itself, the main thing I can say is that it’s honest, timely, and timeless altogether. It aims to articulate people as they are and present information in order to properly educate the audience away from past practices of ignorance. I don’t think much sets me apart but that is by design. I want people to get this feeling that they can do what I do, simply because they can. All they need to do is hone in on what they want out of their craft and afterwards commit to it. For me, I picked up a camera early and used it to articulate my minimalist viewpoints so that the outside world can fill in the gaps with their interpretations. I am proud that with this mindset, I have built a small following who anticipate my newest works and will fully commit themselves to the worlds and universes I aspire to build. And it is this prospect of architecture that excites me above anything else. With each photoshoot, video, audio collage, etc, I am always thinking about the bigger picture and how fluid things will be amongst one another. As a result, my works as Daniel Leka and my works under my “20 Year Crisis” imprint are intentional and impactful in my eyes.

In terms of how I got to where I am professionally, it’s the perfect combination of work I’ve conducted in public and private. In public, people see the photo works and are instantly intrigued with what I capture because the subjects are typically brought into my world and in my world, I view things through their eyes. Same goes with the video and audio collages that I compile. Yet, with the private work, it’s a grand amount of moodboarding, emailing, and patience. With moodboarding, it’s simply about painting the picture in as concise a manner as possible, creating an image that my subject can empathize with and understand altogether. As for emailing and patience, these go hand in hand, with patience existing in tandem as well as independently of these previous concepts. With emailing, it’s countless hours of researching the right people to connect with and addressing them as humans. Leading with sincerity is more important than the quality of one’s work and I find that sincerity is what separates the good ones from the great ones. And lastly, patience. This is a concept that manifests within the email process when potential clients ignore your messages as well as when someone is a bit of a grievance in how they address you. It also manifests in aligning with other’s schedules and a bunch of other miscellaneous things that ultimately make your vision come to life. Yet, when fully fleshing out that aforementioned vision, patience is the most important thing to always consider. From my experience, rushing into a project or idea without fully considering it leads to half baked execution and that’s something I always try to avoid. It is important that one never sacrifices their vision and is patient in executing and hears constructiveness that may enhance it. You never know where that’ll lead you. The path is never easy and anybody who tells you otherwise may soften you enough to knock you out with a right hook later. Challenges arise in all aspects and I think that it is important to welcome those with open arms because that is a part of the process.

All in all, when thinking of me, I not only want these words uttered here to speak of me but I want my work to speak for itself. When one thinks of “Daniel Leka” or “20 Year Crisis,” I want one to think of honesty, timely work that is simultaneously timeless in its essence.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
Truthfully, there is only one spot that I would really want to show a friend if they were to come visit me and out of secrecy of the place, I want to refrain from sharing it so that the magic is preserved a little bit. Just know that it is the place I recharge and realign myself altogether. After strenuous work that consistently challenges me and often times makes me anxious, I go to this place to remind myself of the natural landscapes that surround us on a continuous basis. I will continue to go to this place as long as I can with the utmost consistency and to whoever comes across me in person, ask me about it. Only then would I tell you about it.

Yet, when it comes to other places to hang out, I find comfort in hiking trails and so I would take my friend to a trail on the Pacific Palisades, a nice picnic near Lake Balboa, and a little adventure with Ernest E Debs Regional Park. These places are what shape my experience in LA because they offer a brief escape into the natural world, all the while overlooking the industrial world that exists in the city. It’s the perfect balance of modernism in the world that would allow exploration not just in the physical sense but also in conversations we share.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
I am the byproduct of circumstance and the people that have been placed in my life. Therefore, the circumstances I have been placed in, from the education I’ve received in and out of school to the opportunities that I have been blessed with, are all to thank for where I am today. Yet, in recognizing different people in my life who have shaped me into what I am, it’s a few I would like to name off:

To my family, extended and nonextended alike, thank you. In particular, thank you mother for instilling in me compassion and empathy, thank you Helen for giving me the drive to be great and relentless on my journey, and thank you father for always recognizing the person I currently am and not who I once was. I hope I’m doing you all proud.

To my colleagues and creative collaborators, I thank you for your commitment to innovation. Thank you all for being daring on your journeys and for never settling and always striving for the best you can possibly attain. And thank you for allowing me to enter your life at the particular point in time that I did and for allowing me to learn up close. No matter how close we are, I will always value that time and will always show my love and support without ever drawing attention to myself. It’s your time to shine and I’ll know when it’s my time. So thank you.

Finally, to my teachers, academic, spiritual, and street wise. I thank you for granting me the opportunity to garner a full perspective of what this life really is. For allowing me to see fraudulence early and potential in the most unsuspecting places. Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to be at peace with myself and for pushing me to grow as an individual first and foremost. Thank you for placing me in positions that always ensure valuable lessons, no matter the end result. These all have helped me understand the person I am better today and I will continue to seek you all out as I go towards the next season of life. I am forever grateful and promise to continue onward and offer the guidance you’ve presented me with upon others.

Website: https://www.danielleka.com/ , https://www.20yearcrisis.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/danielfleka/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/daniel-leka/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/danielflekaa

Image Credits
Personal Photo By Helen Leka All Additional Photos By Daniel Leka. Models accredited in order of appearance: Lihem Russom Michaela Shelton Helen Leka Kayla Bryant Alby Solomon Coralie Diora Karon Marshall