Julia’s Morning, with Window in Inverness, California c. 1975

Joanne Leonard made this black and white photograph, Julia’s Morning, with Window in Inverness, California, at an undetermined time. The soft light of dawn filters through lace curtains, casting a gentle glow on the scene. I imagine Leonard, camera in hand, waiting for the perfect moment to capture the quiet intimacy of a child asleep, bathed in the morning light. The composition is so tender, with the ruffles of the curtains framing the window like a proscenium arch, and the sleeping baby centered on a little bed. It reminds me a bit of what it’s like to paint. You start with a single mark, and then another, and another, and slowly, intuitively, a picture emerges. I wonder if Leonard was thinking about the play of light and shadow, and how they shape our perception of the world? Did she see the photograph as a way to freeze a fleeting moment in time, a meditation on the passage of time and the transience of life? She takes a scene, a place, a time and renders it universal. Artists, we're always in conversation, exchanging ideas across time, inspiring each other's creativity. It's a beautiful thing, this messy, uncertain, ambiguous, and embodied expression.