Les Enfants

Les Enfants d’Ouranos, Lune, 2023 is a special, hand-finished lithograph from JR's newest series Les Enfants d'Ouranos. 

JR personally pasted the moons and painted the stars on the lithographs, creating unique editions and a moving universe. 

Unveiling this new photographic and technical process, JR renders the portraits of the children in a mysterious, uncanny manner. The negative space allows him to reveal what, until now, has remained invisible: the divinity of children emanating from carefree innocence and ingenuity. With this new series, JR instills the images of the children who are directly impacted by global conflict and living in refugee camps with transcendence and the opportunity to command influence and create a new world.

In these images, surfaces reflecting light are reversed and presented as shadows and where shadows exist, the areas are filled with light. The reversal of light and dark conveys a sense of otherworldliness to these children’s depictions and blurs specificities and particularities. They become atmospheric portraits imbued with a primordial or mythological quality as referenced by the title. 

Les Enfants D’Ouranos are children in the process of becoming adults, a transition where all possibilities of change and transformation lie. Their ‘yet to be determined’ adultness and the reminder of their divine existence place them in space and time as Titans — who existed well before the world was created and defined.

JR sees and captures the moment where all possibilities lie, where the world is yet to be elucidated, where hierarchies can be inverted, where the status quo and preconceived notions can be challenged and new, more benign, social constructs can be envisioned. It is in this new field where everything is possible. 

Les Enfants D’Ouranos is a reminder that, during that process of determination and consolidation, it’s valuable to look through a reversal lens to identify spaces that open up possibilities for the future.

Lithograph sold framed:

Flat frame made from koto wood that is tinted with black India ink and waxed (15x40mm). 

The flat frame is backed by a beveled frame that has a bar for easy hanging. 

The lithograph is pasted on three backings (a 1mm aluminum plate, wood block, and DIBOND panel) that raise the artwork, allowing it to float suspended within the frame.

The lithograph is covered with VAR70 anti-reflective glass