The InsIde OuT PrOjecT
The Inside Out project is the world’s largest participatory art project, transforming messages of personal identity into pieces of artistic work. The concept of French artist J.R., Inside Out was the result of J.R. winning the 2011 TED Foundation Prize and his subsequent opportunity to make “a wish to change the world.” His wish was simple: for all the people of the world to stand up for what they care about, and together, turn the world Inside Out. With the TED community’s help and support, J.R. wanted to share his already popular style of ‘street art,’ the pasting of large-scale black and white portraits in the public space, as a tool for people to express themselves around the world. He wanted to give people the opportunity to take ownership of their own image, and to give them a voice to speak out and share their story with the world—thus bringing us all closer together. The Inside Out project allows groups of individuals to submit their portraits online along with a statement about the focus of their group; Inside Out mails back large black and white posters in return. The idea is for a group to then take their posters and paste them in a public space, helping to draw attention to their statement. The group is encouraged to film and document the pasting. Then, along with their original portrait and statement, Inside Out uploads the project into their online database for the rest of the world to view. To date they have had over 120,000 people in more than 108 countries participate in the project.
More on J.r.
J.R. exhibits freely in the streets of the world, catching the attention of people who are not typical museum visitors. After finding a camera in the Paris subway, J.R. began photographing the city’s subways and rooftops. He started pasting his photographs on the walls, lining the streets, and in 2006 he pasted his “Portrait of a Generation” series in huge formats in the bourgeois districts of
Paris. These were portraits of suburban “thugs” making scary faces, mocking the way the media portrayed them. The reaction was so positive that Paris City Hall allowed J.R. to wrap its building with his photos. J.R. had officially arrived as an artist, and a few years later, those same large format black and white portraits would lead to the Inside Out project.
No. 030 THE STNDRD LIFESTYLE - THE ARTIST ISSUE
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