(Triest 1856 - 1914 Abbazia)

Lea von Littrow was born into an old Austrian aristocratic family. Her father was a cartographer and author and was - as the director of the local nautical academy - posted to Trieste, where Camilla Leontine von Littrow was born in 1860. One of her uncles was the famous astronomer, university professor and founder of the Vienna Observatory Carl Ludwig von Littrow, who was married to the feminist Auguste von Littrow. Their daughter, Lea Littrow's cousin, was the paintress Ella von Littrow, who later married and changed her name to Lang, whose biography is sometimes mixed up with the one of Lea Littrow.

The coastal landscape around Trieste and Abbazia, where Lea Littrow grew up, became a constant motive of her paintings. She painted several harbour scenes, bays, and sketches of the breaking waves. She received her education in Paris, where she was influenced by the impressionists, as a student of Jean d’Alheim. Lea Littrow was bound in friendship as well as artistically to her colleague Olga Wisinger-Florian, with whome she shared her interest for the landscape of Dalmatia. Because it was difficult to gain acceptance as a female artist at the fin de siècle, Lea Littrow often signed her paintings with her synonym Leo Littrow.