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Peace for Paris artist reveals touching inspiration behind symbol that went viral

In the days since the atrocities, his arresting image, captioned “Peace for Paris”, has been shared many thousands of times on social media worldwide, becoming a global expression of solidarity, resistance and hope for peace.

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The lights were turned back on Sunday evening, but the usual twinkling which occurs for five minutes at each hour has not yet been restarted. “I think the simpler, the better, the more universally understood it can be”, said Jullien of the power of illustration. “I wanted it to not be only the big cities with iconic structures and built in lights but also iconic locations which could be still be lit with a bit of effort and time”. “However, this would not stop us from finding and punishing the perpetrators”.

One artist’s heartfelt tribute to the innocent victims was at the center of much social media activity the night of the attacks.

The image has been retweeted over 59,000 times and has 44,000 likes on Twitter. For people, who are still planning to visit the City of Love, they must evaluate the risks involved before deciding to fly there again.

“I express myself visually, so my first reaction was to draw a symbol of peace for Paris”, he said.

Hotel group Marriott is waiving cancellation fees for bookings at its 15 properties in Paris through November 28 and has increased security at a number of them.

Cancelling the finals would be “playing the game of the terrorists”, tournament organiser Jacques Lambert told French radio station RTL.

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“The first thing we feel is fear”. I felt like there was a need for peace. “We pray for the injured and we hold them all in our hearts”. And I just sort of tried to combine both symbols – peace and Paris – into this graphic. We share and check that everybody’s OK, try to understand what’s going on. And then things sort of quickly seemed to escalate. It was my way of communicating with the people I know and showing that I was thinking about everyone affected in Paris.

Police clear the Eiffel Tower in Paris on Tuesday