I Take YOUR Picture, Gary Leonard

BGF: Gary! I'm TAKING YOUR PICTURE! HAHAHA
Gary: What?
BGF: Stand still!
Gary: What?
BGF: Don't move! I'm not real good with things that move!
Gary: How's the light?
BGF: Like I care!

Gary Leonard is one of the treasures of this city, everywhere all the time chronicling it for decades. I would kill to get my hands on his archives and to organize them (if they aren't already...but I suspect they're not because he's always on the streets shooting stuff), and then work to find a permanent home for them come that distant day when he stops shooting. His archives need a safe home for future generations of LA historians. Here's a random article about him. He took a picture of Me & the Chris Ware Purse a couple of years ago! I was thrilled. (Note for clarity, the picture he took was at another event, not the one described in the link.)

Leonard has recently opened the Gary Leonard Studio/Gallery at 740 S. Olive St. downtown, a space he also uses to showcase other artists. The current show up, he told me who it was, but I forget at this moment of typing. I think it's a local editorial cartoonist. The second Thursday of each month is open house! That would be THURSDAY, not TUESDAY, as  some of us who are short on brain thought at first, which explains why we went wandering around Olive Street on the wrong Tuesday evening and ended up Confused. THURSDAY. It's on THURSDAYS. Next open house is THURSDAY, May 8th, 6 to 9 p.m.

Gary also wins the Most Awesome Business Card Award. Mine are cool, but his are awesome. They're partly in braille. He's a photog and his buiz cards are partly in braille. That's some heavy post-modern shit.

Hey, that picture didn't turn out too badly, for an ambush shot...