Jimmy Jam Video Art Show

Written by Patricia Yanez

On Thursday, November 13th was the opening of our first "solo" collaboration show with Leroy Johnson.

There are two more opportunities to see this show. This coming Wednesday, November 19 and the Wednesday before Thanksgiving. Email me for details. It's a good one and the Philomathean Society's gallery, at Penn, is very intimate and special.

Hope to see you there!

This is what I read:

There are names to acknowledge for their unconditional support expressed through shared resources, knowledge, skills, time, and patience. Their generosity has been key in how this exhibition came together. To Martín Castro, Genevieve Carminati, Nick Feeley, Ryan Compton, Margie Wood, and James Oliver: thank you. And muchísimas gracias to Amanda Hunt, who invited us to the Philomathean Society’s gallery.

My father passed away on September 29th, and I had the chance to go to Chile for his funeral, to speak about him, and to share a few sweet memories with everyone present. Leroy, to me, was a father figure. He and my father were close in age and knew of each other. Leroy would encourage me to communicate with my dad. He would say, “How is your father?” or “Have you spoken to your father?” or “Tell Jorge I said hello.” And so, they greeted each other back and forth through me. I spoke a lot about Leroy, and my dad got to hear about him too.

I last saw my father in August, right before school started. His last couple of years were rough, to say the least, so when I saw him at the end of summer, I knew it was the last time I would see him in this life. I felt I had to say or do something to help him let go of his body somehow. I had done something similar when my grandmother passed away, after a friend told me to do this. I told my father: “Don’t be afraid. When the time comes, you will hear a lot of voices and see a lot of lights. When that happens, ask for Leroy Johnson,” and I put up a sign with Leroy’s name on the wall. “He will be there waiting for you,” and I described Leroy as he appeared in my dream shortly after he passed away.

When I returned, my father ended up in the hospital again, and when asked if he’d prefer to be in the hospital or at the residence, he chose the residence, which was strange, because we had talked about keeping him in the hospital. His caregiver told me that while he was in the hospital, he said he wanted to return to the residence because his friend was there. “Who?” she asked. “Leroy Johnson.”

Back in 2022, when Leroy passed away, I was in Chile and I couldn’t be here for his funeral. Leroy left us when night meets day on August 8th. That same day in Santiago, around 11 a.m., I was downtown with my niece, nephew, and mother, and a street vendor had a brown paper bag with the title “Jimmy Jam” written on it. I took a picture of the man in his purple jacket. I couldn’t believe it. Later that day, I found out Leroy had passed.

You are here because you know who Leroy was (and) is. I knew it. I knew he was a giant the first time I saw his work. Years passed, and the second time we met, I didn’t let go. That was in December 2018 at James Oliver Gallery, during a Philabundance fundraising event. I recognized Leroy’s work and started looking for him. When I saw him, we both said, “You!” I grabbed his arm and dragged him to my studio. I told my business partner at the time, “We cannot do a documentary about Philadelphia artists without Leroy Johnson!”

After that, things happened quickly yet organically. I started going to his studio; we would talk, I would ask questions. Then I started handing him things, then organizing things… and then I started bringing my camera to his studio. I became his assistant and videographer. About a month later, he told me he had a show coming up at City Hall, and that he’d been given a case to display his work for Philadelphia Jazz Month in 2019. We had already started making Jimmy Jams by then. I gave him an idea for the case, and we ran with it.

Sometime before April 2019, I cleared a wall in my home office, moved the furniture around, taped two large sheets of paper together and onto the wall, grabbed a box of black permanent markers, set up the lights, and rolled five different cameras on Leroy while we listened to jazz (mostly Sonny Rollins). He drew non-stop for two hours at a time. Jazz Citywas completed on the fifth day. I didn’t know what he was going to draw. I never did. I just documented him doing his thing. Nobody is cool in their eighties. Leroy was it.

One of the best moments I had with Leroy was the day he sat next to me determined to learn how to edit. I showed him the color grading page and how things worked. Leroy knew everything there was to know about color theory, so watching his expression change as he dragged the mouse over the color wheel and saw the colors respond exactly as he knew they would (in real time!) is something very hard to describe.

I can’t remember his exact words, but I heard Leroy say more than once that when he touched clay, something happened to him, something intense and determining. I later learned from Genevieve, his partner, that he had that same experience with video that he had with clay. And I got to witness that. All the colors you see in our Jimmy Jams were created by Leroy Johnson. Of all the videos, Jazz City is the longest, and it is the only one projected from a screen. The playlist you hear is what we listened to while Leroy drew Jazz City. All the Jimmy Jams, except for this one, live on Leroy’s Instagram.

Leroy understood me like few people do in the United States because of his profound understanding of history. He knew the context in which I was raised based on what he read. Boy, did he read. He would say that the marble stones at the Free Library are worn down by the numerous times Little Leroy went up and down those steps.

I didn’t fully grasp America and its identity crisis until I met Leroy. He showed me “the other” United States, and I realized this country has always had two sets of rules. I began to understand what being Black in the U.S. might be like.

I am so grateful to have had Leroy as a mentor. I grew exponentially with him. He made me realize how ageist our society is. I lost my fear of death and aging. I believe that there is something after this life, I’m not sure what. But when it’s my turn, when I see the lights and hear the voices, I will be calling his name.

Before I finish, I’d like everyone to have something in their glass for a toast. While you do that, I want to extend two invitations. One is to the closing show on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, when his cousin, Mike Munford, jazz sax player and composer, will share the piece he is composing for Jazz City. So stay tuned.

The other invitation is to help me share Leroy’s legacy through your memories of him, recorded with a camera, of course. All you need to say is when and where.

Is everyone’s glass full?

Leroy is now my ancestor, and I am determined to honor him every chance I get.

To Leroy and his legacy!

Happy happy!