Since August 2016, I have been exploring French urban art through the website QG des artistes (Artists' Headquarters). By writing in-depth interviews, I aim to ask artists about their backgrounds, how they approach public space as a place of creation, and also to share with them reflections on their practice itself, from its specific characteristics to its potential place in art history. This essay follows the same approach, coming after more than one hundred interviews\u2014a sufficient collection of opinions to develop a panoramic view of the motivations of street artists today. The goal here is not to determine which term to use: "street art" or "urban art," as most of the people I met refused to define themselves in this way for fear of being pigeonholed. This text does not aim to determine whether urban art is a distinct artistic movement or a super-medium encompassing a wide range of practices, each becoming a specific sub-movement. While these issues and their implications are addressed, they are not the central focus of this work, which revolves around the concept of time. Therefore, my primary criterion for grouping the artists included in this reflection is that they have engaged\u2014or continue to engage\u2014in public spaces repeatedly throughout their careers. While the text gives ample voice to artists from the French scene and relies heavily on their commentary, this does not preclude the contribution of certain major international figures, particularly American ones, when it provides an appropriate complementary perspective. Although most of these reflections stem from firsthand interviews, others (such as those with Keith Haring or Banksy) are occasionally relevant, adding further depth to this line of thought. Finally, this essay aims to be an open reflection on an artistic gesture at the height of its development, a gesture undergoing constant transformation. Through the voices of those interviewed, it offers a snapshot of a remarkable moment in the history of art, one that allows actors from completely different life paths and with diverse perspectives on the world to share a common creative space.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Depuis ao\u00fbt 2016, j\u2019ai entrepris \u00e0 travers le site internet QG des artistes une exploration de l\u2019art urbain fran\u00e7ais. Par la r\u00e9daction d\u2019entretiens long-format, je cherche \u00e0 interroger les artistes sur leur parcours, la fa\u00e7on dont ils et elles appr\u00e9hendent l\u2019espace public en tant que lieu de cr\u00e9ation, mais aussi \u00e0 partager avec eux une […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-40","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qgdesartistes.fr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/40","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qgdesartistes.fr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qgdesartistes.fr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qgdesartistes.fr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qgdesartistes.fr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/qgdesartistes.fr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/40\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":41,"href":"https:\/\/qgdesartistes.fr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/40\/revisions\/41"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qgdesartistes.fr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}