The Re Project

“It’s time to re think our future, re build our relationship to the earth, re evaluate our approach to life, re member where we come from, re fresh our memories, re birth our true selves and re unite with nature. Time to re evaluate how we take care of each and to re connect with where you are. here. now.”

– Pandora Graessl

 

 

In the series The Re Project, Pandora Graessl prompts introspection for a collective awakening of consciousness.

With a backdrop of Nature in its raw state, the series highlights the urgency of coming together, starting over, and redefining our ways of life. The posters are installed in Paris, Arles, Berlin, Miami, and Mexico City, with more to come. It is like a guerrilla campaign focused on nature. A public exhibition for all.

When I heard about this project it really resonated with me as I feel it is extremely aligned with the message I am trying to convey with Funga. I had the pleasure of interviewing Pandora about her Re Project a few weeks ago. Read below.

 

 

 

What is The Re Project?

It is a proposition to (re)look at things differently. It is an opportunity to start new, to transcend and evolve.

It is a make-up of all these words starting with RE, such as re-alize, re-member, re-connect, re-learn; that all call back to our origins in certain ways and put in perspective these crazy lives we are leading.

It proposes to re-flect, to take a moment, to re-fresh our minds, to re-think and re-act.
The Re Project is a kind of a shout out to awakening, a re-set.

 

 

When did you come up with the idea for this project?

I was part of a collective in Paris called GAF (GIVE A FUCK) that was initiated by my friend Allegria Torassa. She came up with a very punchy tagline that people could very much relate to. Give a fuck. Give a Fuck about the planet, give a fuck about recycling, give a fuck about Iran, Give a fuck about tomorrow, and so on. The main message is to care, to wake up from our little comfort and get involved. It was very aligned with all my concepts of how to awaken people and re-sensibilise them.

In the years before the pandemic, we were doing many guerrilla campaigns, strikes, workshops at my house, huge marches for ecology, including raves in Paris. We were inviting people to “join the dance” and activating energies.
We launched the photo campaign for Paris Photo in September 2019, and I put them all around the Grand Palais. A lot of people came together to make this happen. We got all our prints for free, and numerous guerrilla people helped us place them all around the city. This is how the project first started.

 

 

 

What was the inspiration behind the name?

Another friend, part of the collective, kira lillie comissioned me to do a campaign with my photos. I already had an archive of work I wanted to put out in the streets. It was the perfect momentum to do it. She really pushed for it. The point was really to resensitize people around nature and its beauty. Let nature speak through my images.

 

 

Initially, they wanted me to put poems or text over the pictures, but I didn’t like the idea of too many words. I concluded that I wanted one strong word with a common impulsion.

That is when the re- idea came, which was the perfect thread I was searching for.

We went for 11 re-words and images
11 is a sacred number, a portal. Always love a meaningful number. And there we were opening doors!

Eventually, during the pandemic, when I re-launched this project through a huge emailing campaign, I came up with its title – The Re Project. I wanted it to be kind of a new world order, some sort of secret underground project that would spread the world with its essence and keep on living and growing by itself.

 

 

 

 

What was the re- word that triggered the rest?

I have three words that stand out for me the most:
Realise, remember, and rebirth.

Rebirth, particularly because I think in a life time we die many times. It is good to remember that you can die and be born again. Dying is a process of life; it’s necessary to evolve.
Remember – because we have all answers within us. With all this social conditioning, we tend to forget our true roots. Remembering who we truly are, our origins, our mission, our essence.. It’s a power we under train.
And obviously, realise, because this whole project was a realisation in itself.

 

 

 

 

How did the project continue after your first exhibition?

A few month later, during the pandemic, I still had quite a few of these posters at home. We were all trapped in our houses, and I felt like the re- project was an echo to what we were going through. There was an opportunity offered to us to actually look at things differently. It was a moment of truth where we were all confronted with this new reality and realised what truly matters.

On the routes I was allowed to walk around in my district, I started putting the posters up again at night with a friend and then slowly during the day. I launched a huge newsletter to an A list of people and sent the imagse at different milestones during the Covid months, such as full moons, a new law, a huge strike, Black Lives Matter, etc

That’s how The Re Project really started.

It gained quite some interest and an amazing response. It came at the right time because people were realising and reflecting a lot. It was also a time to reconnect to nature or loved ones and, above all, to ourselves. That was the world’s call to reset, start anew, and go through a global rebirth. We all came to a point during the pandemic where we had a personal crisis which meant we had to deconstruct and reconstruct ourselves to adapt to the situation. It was a call to reaction because before the pandemic, we were all hitting a wall, and that isolated time showed us how dysfunctional we actually were and gave us a moment for us. just us.

 

 

 

What was your collaboration with Souvenir about?

They asked me to do a t-shirt with them during the pandemic to do with my Re Project. I created a lexicon of above 100 re- words on how to reboot the world. We worked on a Talisman around it and developed a symbol with my friend Casilde.

A man surrounded by many layers of aura.

It looks like a ripple of energy layers mirroring a vagina shape. The silhouette looks like coming from or going towards another dimension.

The Womb of the Universe.

We eventually used this symbol and carved them around other of my images we used for the campaign. Images of friends and muses around the world, mostly in nature or empowering situations, with their outshining auras.

 

The brainchild of Mallon and his wife Karin Oender, Souvenir Official launched in 2011 in Berlin as a concept gallery with a rotation of souvenirs designed by famous artists, including Marc Brandenburg and Norbert Bisky. “Fashion is a tool of activation and a reaction to events. It is a mirror to society that can question things and become a testament to what happens,” says Mallon.

Souvenir Official and Graessl have also collaborated on a new, long-sleeved T-shirt, a graphic design of a figure surrounded by an aura. “T-shirts are a good way to communicate. It’s on people and it travels, becoming subliminal messages that walk around,” Graessl adds. (taken from a Vogue article about the collaboration)

 

 

 

 

Do you have future plans?

Right before Covid, I hung up posters in the streets of Berlin. Two years ago, I did the project in Miami for Art Basel, and last year, I did the same in Mexico City. I changed all the words to Spanish and put it up for Zona Maco. I brought the project to all the cities I was going to. The idea is to continue it. It is definitely something that needs to be ongoing, we are constantly in need of reminders.

I’m still working on more aura portraits of friends and some pieces connected to this concept, and the idea is to do a larger show re-grouping all these ideas under one roof.

 

 

 

When people see a poster, what do you hope it evokes?

Funny that you use those words because “hope” is exactly the word I would use. That’s what I hope inspires people. Sometimes we feel so stuck, but every day is a new chance, and it is truly never too late to change. So much we need to unlearn to relearn our own way. A proper treasure quest. Maybe that’s the whole game?

And funnily enough, that’s what Pandora left in her box, hope.