[Gallery Walk] "The City Walls Are the Gallery"... JR's Solo Exhibition Changing the World Through Photography

Dreaming of a 'Better World' Through Art
Reflecting Contemporary Society:
Marginalized Women and Discriminated Immigrants Through Photography

The Chinese characters for "photograph" literally mean "to copy the truth." French photographer and street artist JR (40) delivers a powerful message that seeks to change the world through that very "truth." Rather than exhibiting in refined galleries, he uses the walls of streets across the globe as his own gallery, moving freely from place to place. Little is known about him beyond his nationality and age, making him a mysterious figure, but the messages in his works are more intense and vivid than any other. He now meets Korean audiences with his large-scale solo exhibition, "JR: CHRONICLES."

'Portrait of a Generation', Brakaji, Rad Lee, 2004 ⓒ JR-ART.NET[Photo by Lotte Museum]

This exhibition, which surveys JR's artistic journey over the past 20 years, began at the Brooklyn Museum in New York in 2019, traveled to the Kunsthalle Munich in Germany, and has now arrived at the Lotte Museum, marking JR's first exhibition in Asia. JR explained, "Although this is not a retrospective, it allows us to look back on my works so far and examine the process by which individuals and communities have brought about change."

JR, who began his career as a graffiti artist, started focusing on people as subjects and their stories after he happened to find a Samsung camera in the Paris subway in 2001 and began photographing his fellow artists' work. In his early projects, he attached his photographs to building exteriors and framed them to present them as if they were works in a gallery, which drew significant attention. This concept soon evolved into a public art project, in which he captured images of local residents in specific areas and collaborated with them by reflecting their stories and messages during the installation process.

Dreaming of a 'Better World' Through Art

JR gained fame in 2005 with his "Portrait of a Generation" project. In 2004, he photographed children from Les Bosquets, a ghetto in the suburbs of Paris called Montfermeil, and enlarged and pasted these images on the walls there, holding his first solo exhibition. The following year, a violent protest broke out in the same area, mainly involving immigrants. At that time, Zyed Benna and Bouna Traore, who were middle school students in the area, died from electrocution after falling onto a transformer at an EDF substation while fleeing from a police identity check. This incident became the catalyst for the protests. Young immigrants, who lived on the outskirts of the city facing discrimination and economic hardship, took to the streets en masse. At the time, more than 10,000 cars and over 300 buildings were set on fire across France, as arson and violence swept through society.

Migrants, Mayra, Picnic across the Border, Tecate, Mexico-U.S.A, Installation image, 2017. ? JR-ART.NET
Photo by Lotte Museum

JR then returned to Les Bosquets and began a new project with local youth. He photographed their portraits, enlarged the images, and displayed them on the streets along with the subject's name, age, and address. The representative work "Brakaji, Rad Lee" features a young man appearing to aim a gun at someone, but in reality, he is holding a camera. The artist sharply questions the underlying public perception, shaped by biased media coverage, that makes a camera held by a person of color appear as a weapon simply because of their skin color.

In his 2007 "Face 2 Face" project, JR photographed people in Israel and Palestine with the same professions-taxi drivers, teachers, athletes-and displayed large-scale portraits side by side on both sides of the wall dividing Israel and Palestine. Since there was no interaction between the regions, people only recognized each other through the media, and it was impossible to tell from the photos alone whether someone was Israeli or Palestinian. This work also sounded an alarm about the distorted public perceptions created by the media.

'Women Are Heroes', JR-ART.NET.
[Photo by Lotte Museum]

Reflecting Contemporary Society: Marginalized Women and Discriminated Immigrants Through Photography

In 2008, the artist traveled to the favelas of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. He took close-up photos of local women's eyes and faces, enlarged them, and attached them to the exteriors of 40 homes scattered across the hills of the favela. The faces and eyes of women unrecognized by society gazed out over the city of Rio de Janeiro. In the "Women Are Heroes" project, the artist paid tribute to women who became victims of war, crime, rape, and political or religious fanaticism in regions synonymous with violence, making their hidden stories visible through his exhibition. This project later expanded to Kenya, Cambodia, India, Sierra Leone, and other countries, creating a significant impact.

Previously, the artist had presented outdoor installations using anamorphosis-a technique that creates optical illusions-at major landmarks in cities such as the Louvre Museum in Paris, the Palais de Tokyo, Rome, and Egypt. In this exhibition, he unveils a new work featuring the Han River as seen from Lotte Tower. The piece, installed on the gallery window, offers viewers a sense of connection between the inside of the gallery and the outside world. The artist said, "With the view of the Han River cutting through Seoul, I wanted visitors to experience the visual thrill of moving between reality and illusion, as if they were connected to the outside world through a fissure in the gallery." He added, "I am always interested in how art can influence society and what kinds of changes it can bring about." The exhibition runs until August 6 at the Lotte Museum in Sincheon-dong, Songpa-gu, Seoul.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.