My gallery is the street…
Folie Douce Magazine: With you, can any street corner be transformed into an exhibition? Does the place have to have some special significance for you to put your posters up there? How do you choose the locations? cThe media help me choose the places that I focus on. In areas of tension like the Middle East or Brazil that get a lot of media coverage, I try to create images that offer different points of view to the simplistic stances taken by the global media. Urban architecture is one of my biggest inspirations; it’s the wall that chooses the image or the way it’s framed. FDM: Do CCTV cameras deter you from putting up your art? Are you still creating art illegally? JR: All the art I create in countries like Brazil and Kenya is illegal, and even in India and Cambodia. As far as my pro-
jects are concerned, I work illegally. It’s how I can be sure of success and total independence in those places. The exhibitions that follow are legal. Sticking up 8 km of posters on Île Saint Louis in Paris or a dozen buildings in a Swiss city is something that gets noticed in any case! FDM: Do you hate dusty old museums? Is that why you exhibit the way you do, outdoors? JR: I’m not trying to get known in the street so I can go on to exhibit in galleries. My gallery is the street. From my first projects I realised that in the street I can reach people who never go to museums. For me, the street is the biggest gallery in the world. What’s good about indoor exhibitions is that I can contextualise my street exhibitions. I can show videos and colour prints, and delve deeper into the project. For me, museums are complementary.
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