3rd October-14th November.
Both the Greek Street and Charing Cross Lazarides galleries and in the surrounding streets of London.
Standing in a room three stories up on Charing Cross Road, I realised a few things. The first, I was the only person not wearing a suit (this happens often). The second, the art on the walls was of awful swirling lines. The third thing, I was clearly in the wrong place. The last thing I realised is how far removed everyone in this room was away from the essence of the work I had come to see. Looking around, I thought to myself, I live in a society where we all have mobile phones, ipods, and various other toys, maybe even a pre “credit crunch” mortgage, this is civilization after all right? – but the reality is this, if you lose your job and don’t work for 2 or 3 months, your house is taken away, your phone is disconnected and you have no place to charge your precious ipod.
28 Millimeters: Women, is centered around the women of the Favela Morro da Providencia area of Rio de Janeiro. Movies like City of God have served to bring the plight of the Brazilian male to the western eye, but JR, and film maker Ladj Ly focused on women’s struggle in the slums. Earlier this year the pair immersed themselves within the community to capture the vibe and bring back an expose on the hardships of living below the radar of supposed civilization. The approach to start with was more an act of reportage than merely photographing the desperate, grim surface of the ghetto. Taking in the stories of the inhabitants struggles against not only poverty, but the tense fear that hangs over the province like an oppressive cloud created by the areas controlling factions, the drug dealers, and the army.
Shooting with local photographer Mauricio Hora, JR pieced together a ghetto torn with stories of both loss and hope. Recent events had led to the tragic deaths of three local men at the hands of the army, leaving the community grieving. JR and his team arrived at the perfect time to capture the pure heart of the ghetto laid bare for all to see, perhaps serving in a way if not uplift; at least distract the people from their tears. The main focus of the work being the women, the widows left behind to carry on a give the young hope.
The photography style is simple, in your face 28mm Wide-angle portraits, with no illusion of make up (or Photoshop!). After shooting, these pictures have been blown up to giant proportions and then with help of the kids of the ghetto, pasted up around the subject’s homes on the hillside slums.
The results can be seen bridging the gap between the Lazerides Galleries (Charing Cross Road and Greek Street) JR has taken up the whole side street, pasting his photography pavement to roof of the Foyles building, with the black and white end result of the project.100ft smiles from the ghetto kids beam out to greet all who pass between the two galleries showing JRs work.
The Greek Street gallery has photos mounted on doors, picture frames, mirrors and any cast away pieces of wood paneling JR could find. Pasted on the floor, walls and ceiling of the Charing Cross gallery, are reels of (soon to be defunct) Kodak film, which have been enlarged to cover the whole place with faces from various worldwide ghettos. The main attraction for me is the accompanying 15minute long video which is projected on to the wall. The video is a 1 take speed up/slo-mo tour through the (barely a meter wide at times) streets, cleverly weaving in and out of peoples houses giving a wide angle view of the locals who now have their images pasted like billboard adverts across the entire hillside.
The filming is possibly the most vivid use of the format, with the most moving results I have ever witnessed. It is perfectly edited together to give, at times, the effect of “bullet-time-photography” but at the same time keeping it entirely grounded and focused on the heart of the matter.
This isn’t merely an art show; these are lives of people who have bared their soul, not so their image can travel the world, but purely their story. At no point do these proud people ask for our sympathy, they simply would be offended. With determination of steel this is a community with the strongest of bonds, much stronger than the cracked cement they are housed on. At the same time, admirably, JR asks for no plaudits for bringing this to the attention of the outside world.
This is truly excellent work, enjoy it why it lasts.
Official JR website
Philip Procter