Raising questions: street artist JR

JR and Marco , Face 2 Face, 2007

JR(France, 1983) is an internationally known photographer, street artist and activist. He started out as a graffiti artist until he discovered photography. Nowadays he makes oversized black-and-white photographic canvases.

His controversial artworks consist of socially tinted photos, video, prints, books and street art.
JR collaborates with local people on his artistic projects, listens to and is interested in people in an attempt to bring communities together.

His aim is to bring art into the streets, where people who would never go into a museum, can be reached. He explores new ways of exhibiting in an urban environment. According to the artist the streets and walls add extra meaning to his pieces.

The urban activist wants to evoke critical reflections on society. His humanist works tackle concepts as identity, sexism, freedom, preconceptions, violence, commitment, ...

Portraits of a Generation(2004-2006, his first 28 mm project), an initially unauthorized project, is a collection of huge close up portraits of young Parisian ghetto inhabitants plastered on the walls of their homes in order to change the spectators' view on the social representation of these human beings who are often treated as scum.

In 2007 JR photographed Israelis and Palestinians for his second 28mm urban project entitled Face2 Face(e.g. Portraits of twins brothers 2007). The large scale black and white portraits were illegally shown face to face in eight towns on either side of the Separation Barrier. The project’s goal was to show the citizens' similarities in the expression of emotions as well as the complexity of the situation in the Middle East. Another combination of art and laughter to break down stereotypes. Gerard Maximin also made a film about this project: Faces.

In 2008, JR made a documentary film called Women Are Heroes. It was selected at the 2010 Cannes Film Festival. The film on the dignity of oppressed women draws attention to women's stories on conflicts, violence and their hope on a better future. The artist mainly met men on the street, but realized women held the community together.

In 2008 the versatile artist went to Morro da Providencia, an infamous favela in Rio de Janeiro, where he pasted portraits of its female residents on houses in co-operation with Brazilian youngsters.

Wrinkles of the City( Los Surcos de la ciudad)questions the memory of a city and its inhabitants . Los Surcos de la Ciudad depicts the lives of old inhabitants of Spanish Cartagena. These portraits of living city memories were part of the Biennial at The Shanghai Art Museum.
Although he mostly refrains from the art world , Sotheby's sold his work and work of his was included in Tate Modern's Street Art exhibition(2008).

He received the 2011 TED prize( $ 100.000 ) for global change in an innovative way. Socially conscious as he is, he uses his money to help the featured people in his projects. He paid for a cultural centre in the favela, used prints on vinyl to make waterproof roofs.

This anonymous artist is a master in creating a space where spectator and subject fuse in an attempt to make people think critically all over the world. Or as I would say: JR is a true welfare worker by means of the arts.

www.jr-art.net