Thierry Noir was born in Lyon (France) in 1958. In 1982 he moved to West Berlin, close to the Berlin Wall. From 1984 onwards he painted daily on the west side of the Wall, changing its aspect with his characteristic colourful heads. At the East Side Gallery he painted two pictures. Noir is one of the world’s best-known street artists.
While his work “Hommage an die junge Generation” (“Tribute to the young generation”) is one of the longest and best-known works at the East Side Gallery, French artist Thierry Noir created a second painting at the East Side Gallery. Different to his colourful heads it is an abstract work. For a time, he covered the entire area in heads but in 2009 restored the original version of the second painting. It was important to him to preserve the Wall as a piece of history and so appeal to young people to maintain democracy and peace.
Noir moved into the Georg-von-Rauch house, a youth centre close to the Wall in Kreuzberg, in 1982. From 1984 onwards he painted daily on the west side of the Wall as a sign of resistance and to make it “go away”. His striking colourful heads became world famous. Wall sections that he painted can now be seen in London, New York, Monaco, and Los Angeles as well as in Berlin. Noir lives in Berlin where he continues to paint colourful heads.