JR: The Chronicles of San Francisco

French street artist / photographer JR is undoubtedly one of the most important artists of our time. That’s not just my own non-research-based opinion; TIME named him one of the world’s 100 most influential people in 2018. I haven’t counted but I bet there weren’t many street artists on that list. His larger-than-life black and white photographic portraits always seem to be more than just fascinating close-up photos. There’s always some kind of interesting sociopolitical commentary or juxtaposition at play. He famously started his career by wheat-pasting images of people from Paris’ poorest neighborhoods across some of the city’s most exclusive neighborhoods. In 2009, he covered the rooftops of a slum in Kenya with photos of women who lived there, for his Women Are Heroes project, using waterproof materials which immediately improved the lives of the people living underneath the installation. In 2011 he won the TED prize for his fascinating talk “Use art to turn the world inside out,” which currently has over 3 million views on the platform. The list of outstanding critically-acclaimed works by JR goes on and on…More recently, in early 2018, he started photographing locals in the streets of San Francisco, documenting 1200 locals in the process. The Chronicles of San Francisco is the artist’s “first major digital installation” in California and opened at SF MOMA in May. There are also concurrent/matching wheat-pasted posters and vinyl installations around the city. JR also teamed up with Chronicle Books to release an impressive 160-page hardcover to coincide with the opening. A removable poster unfolds to reveal the entire mural. The work deftly embodies the fascinating melting pot of a city. [Read More]