Growing up in Crenshaw in the 1990s, Justen LeRoy was surrounded by the sounds of Destiny’s Child at the start of every episode of “Proud Family” on the Disney Channel, and R&B artists performing back-to-back on MTV. LeRoy bought his first CD, Brandy’s “Never Say Never”, when he was around 3 years old. Later, Tower Records in Torrance, now closed, became his favorite place to search for albums.
LeRoy, now an artist and musician, describes Crenshaw as “the backbone” of his childhood: He grew up on Crenshaw Blvd and W. 59th St, and attended View Park Prep High School. That’s why LeRoy’s first solo multimedia exhibition, “Lay Me Down in Praise,” at Art + Practice in nearby Leimert Park, is a full-circle moment. Curated by California African American Museum Curator of Visual Arts Essence Harden, the work sits alongside several separate exhibits: Chloë Bass’ “#sky #nofilter: Hindsight for a Future America” and Thaddeus Mosley’s “Forest.” .
LeRoy’s exhibit is a three-channel cinematic installation that implements clips of black artists communing with one another: hugging, sitting, breathing, or moving in unison on film to the sounds of R&B songs. The clips are juxtaposed with images of geological activity such as erupting volcanoes, earthquakes, and roaring oceans. Together the images, along with the sound, imagine what black environmentalism, or advocating for black people to occupy space and build a stronger relationship with nature, could look like. Through his work, LeRoy seeks to connect sounds rooted in the black community with climate change through themes of resistance and regeneration.
“Lay Me Down in Praise,” the exhibition’s title, began as a song LeRoy created with his collaborator Hadyn in 2019. (He ultimately scrapped the song but kept the title.) LeRoy worked with Fred Moten as “thought partners” through the Underground Museum and BLKNWS, and in the process, he became drawn to “wordless wailing,” a musical technique related to the gospel style.
In his essay “Black Mo’nin,” Moten points to Anthony Heilbut’s “The Gospel Sound,” which explains that the wordless moan is meant to describe the indescribable, a sound to communicate what words cannot. For LeRoy, this idea resonates with the concept of melismas, or a group of notes sung as one syllable that often expresses a sentiment without words, also often used in gospel music. It could be “a sigh, a cry, and a scream,” as he describes it. Through LeRoy’s research, he connected the wordless wailing with the groaning of the trees created by the abuse they receive, through rustling, decay and destruction.
“In my relationship with the community throughout my life, we are not talking about climate change or what is happening to the land because we are all thinking about daily survival,” he says.
He first pitched the idea to Harden, a friend he made while working at the Underground Museum, which closed earlier this year. LeRoy feels that it was “bold” of him to ask Harden to consider the idea, since he had never organized an art show before. Harden says that she knew he could deliver.
“A lot of curating is just about building trust between artists and curators, and keeping space for each other,” says Harden. “I did it because he knew him and he knew his own ethic around work and care.”
The result of the release was the 20-minute film available to view at Art + Practice through the end of January 2023. Harden says he hopes the video will travel elsewhere so more art lovers can experience it. “I would love to see this film shown, not just in the US, but hopefully there is a relationship with the diaspora that is really strong,” he says.
The exhibition is not only LeRoy’s first solo show, but also his first film. She collaborated with Kordae Jatafa Henry, who co-directed and edited “Lay Me Down in Praise.” Henry helped plan the logistics of the production, and LeRoy realized her vision for the film. “He really gave me the confidence on set to feel like I was running the show,” LeRoy says of mentoring Henry. LeRoy says the process allowed him to develop his visual language as he struggled to learn alongside the experienced team of filmmakers. Together, they filmed clips of black artists, and LeRoy collected the earthworks for ArtGrid, an archive that collects contributions from cinematographers.
After shooting in July, he went into the studio with Hadyn to work on the score, collecting vibrant melismas from music artists Moses Sumney, Diana Gordon and Nadiah Adu-Gyamfi. They collected around 16 minutes of singing from each artist, then cut and synced their voices behind images of crashing waves and erupting volcanoes playing alongside images of black people moving together. Their voices made long drones, moans, and screams that flowed and clashed against each other. High, twang notes swayed over a deep hum that rose to a wail, all while tectonic plates crashed on the screen.
“How does the earth sound?” LeRoy questions throughout the piece. “What might the Atlantic Ocean really sound like when we think about the slave trade and all the beings at the bottom of the ocean? What song is that?”
He looks to R&B for the answers. “My whole goal has been to bring R&B into the art canon,” says LeRoy. “I think we’ve intellectualized jazz to the core, but I think R&B is just as formative for our being.”
He adds: “It’s really a vessel brought here to connect a lot of our experiences through emotion.”
While music is his main love, LeRoy gravitated towards art while attending UC Irvine, while learning about black contemporary art through Tumblr. She went to her first contemporary art museum, MOCA, at the age of 20 in January 2015. Approximately nine months later, she began working at the museum as a gallery assistant. She then moved on to the Underground Museum where she worked for about six years in various positions. She also curated the 2022 Noah Davis show with Helen Molesworth.
Through his initial journey into the art world, he found himself “hiding behind other pursuits.” As the Underground began to dissolve, the call to create art grew stronger.
“I knew I could be doing what I’m doing now, and I didn’t feel supported enough to do it while I was in college, or didn’t see a path to get there,” he says.
For a long time, LeRoy says he primarily sought financial stability and was too concerned with surviving to envision a career in art. Although he had an interest in the discipline, he felt that there was no avenue or community that would support his efforts. “The things I didn’t have made me want more,” he says.
At the beginning of 2019 he decided to leave the fund and ended up performing at MOMA in April of that same year with the composer and playwright Klein. The following year, LeRoy was included in the Hammer Museum’s 2020 Made in LA exhibition with “SON.” — an audio piece that documents different and diverse facets of black life.
He commemorates career-defining moments like these to the community of friends and supporters he calls home. It’s people like Sumney, Klein, Henry and Harden who remind him of his ability, just testifying to each other’s talent.
“Hiding wasn’t helping me evolve much,” says LeRoy. “The biggest challenge is assuming my power, my purpose and recognizing that I am worthy of having a show, worthy of making an album. I am worthy of people showing up for me.”
This story originally appeared in the Los Angeles Times.
