Leão Lopes (born 1948 in Ribeira Grande, Santo Antão, Cape Verde) is a Cape Verdean director, writer, plastic aritst and professor. As a filmmaker, he made the first ever feature of Cape Verdean fiction, The Island of Contenda (1996), based on a novel by Henrique Teixeira de Sousa. He is also author of various documentary including Bitú (2009) and São Tomé - Os Últimos Contratados (2010). In 1979, he founded AtelierMar in Mindelo, a non-government organization, dedicated to formation of a cultural capacity and local development in which still presides.