“28 Millimètres, Women Are Heroes, Action in the Morro da Providência Favela, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil”

After finding a camera in the Paris metro in 2001, JR decided to travel around Europe to meet those individuals who expressed themselves on walls and building facades through graffiti, taking their portraits and displaying them on the streets.

JR freely exhibits on the streets of the world, attracting the attention of people who are not typical museum visitors. From the suburbs of Paris to the favelas of Brazil and the streets of Istanbul, JR has pasted up huge portraits of little-known people. As of September 2023, more than half a million people from over 150 countries and territories have participated in the project, creating their own installations or entering one of the “Inside Out” photobooths.

JR’s projects include; a large-scale collage in a maximum security prison in California, a TIME magazine cover about guns in America, a 1,200-person video mural featured at SFMOMA, a collaboration with the New York City Ballet, an Oscar-nominated documentary co-directed with French Nouvelle Vague legend Agnès Varda, a collage on the Louvre Pyramid, giant scaffolding installations at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics, and a massive installation on the U.S.-Mexico border fence.

Through his large-scale interventions in public spaces, he makes visible phenomena and people that we usually ignore. The portraits he creates display questioning, penetrating, observant and solemn expressions that capture our attention and remain in our consciousness long after they have been seen.

By remaining anonymous, JR leaves the space open for an encounter between the subject/protagonist and the passerby/interpreter, raising questions, creating social bonds, bringing communities together and raising people's awareness.

Some of his latest solo exhibitions and projects include: “O Papel da Mão”, Galeria Nara Roesler (2023), São Paulo; “JR: Chronicles, at Kunsthalle” (2022), in Munich, Germany; “Truc à Faire”, Galleria Continua (2021), Paris, France; “JR: Chronicles, at Brooklyn Museum” (2019), in New York, USA; “The Chronicles of San Francisco”, at San Francisco Museum of Modern Art - SF MoMA (2019), USA; “Momentum. La Mécanique de l'Épreuve”, at Maison Européenne de la Photographie (2018), in Paris, France; “Chroniques de Clichy-Montfermeil”, at Palais de Tokyo (2017), in Paris, France; “Kikito”, a temporary installation on the Mexico/USA border (2017); “JR at the Louvre”, at the Musée du Louvre (2016), in Paris, France.

Recent group exhibitions include: “Forever is Now” at the Pyramids of Giza (2021), Egypt; “JR, Adrian Piper, Ray Johnson” at the Museum Frieder Burda (2019), Berlin, Germany; “Refuge” at the 21c Museum (2019), Bentonville, USA; “Post No Bills: Public Walls as Studio and Source” at the Neuberger Museum of Art (2016), Purchase, USA; and “Tu dois changer ta vie” at the Tripostal (2015), Lille, France.

His works are part of important public collections of institutions such as: Brooklyn Museum (USA); San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (USA); Museum of Modern Art - MoMA (USA); Palais de Tokyo, Paris, (France); Hong Kong Contemporary Art Foundation (China); among others.