Ballet, Sur les Toits du Louvre #2, Vertical, Paper Block, Paris, France
Year: 2021
Medium: color print, synthetic plaster
Dimensions: 55 x 40 x 8 cm (21 5/8 x 15 3/4 x 3 1/8 in.)
Acquired from PERROTIN, 2022
Even during the COVID-19 lockdown in Paris, JR executed many projects throughout the city. The artwork is based on a photograph that captures a ballet dancer perched on the rooftop of the Louvre. JR has been collaborating on projects with ballet dancers since 2014. It is necessary to focus not only on the elegance of the dreamy scenes of this series but also on the fact that they document real acts. This is especially notable since in 2021, the year this artwork was made, museums in Paris, including the Louvre, closed their doors for seven months as part of lockdown measures in the city. Amid a strangeness where the hustle and bustle of people is gone and the arts are shut out in the city of art, the ballet dancer, airily positioned at the border of the sky and the ground, carries a lightness as if the ground’s weight has disappeared. Another notable aspect of this work is its awkward form: shaped like a piece of paper that has been folded small and then opened without the creases fully stretched out. Although JR calls it a paper block, when facing this strange form, the viewer imagines it might ride the wind and blow away at any moment. However, as visible when looking at the work from its sides, the piece is made of a thick literal block of synthetic plaster, completely betraying the viewer’s impression and hiding a terrifying weight behind its apparent lightness.
