JR Rio de Janerio 06

So there we were, going six hundred and fifty miles per hour at thirty thousand feet in the air on a recent flight when we nearly spilled our martinis all over ourselves.  Turbulence you ask?  Nope – it was our eyes making contact with some incredibly provocative photography.  We had never before seen the work of JR, the anonymous and elusive Parisian photographer known for infiltrating dangerous slums around the world to install his large scale portraits.  Perhaps it was simply the shock of finding something so piercing in an in-flight magazine.  But the more we read and researched about the work, the more fascinating this bridge between architecture and photography became.  Work of this magnitude doesn’t need us and our words getting in the way of it – so we’re going to keep our traps shut, show the work and leave you with one question: Why does this work make the built-environment a better place?

JR Kibera Kenya 02

JR Cartagena Spain

JR Rio de Janerio 04

JR Rio de Janerio 02 photo by VANDERLEI ALMEIDA

JR Kibera Kenya 03

JR Kibera Kenya Train 01

JR Kibera Kenya Train 02

JR Kibera Kenya Train 03