(We'll tell you why street art is THE movement of our generation, and why it's a shame to miss out! )
A hundred years apart, Impressionism and Street Art echo each other. As if adapting a chapter of art history into a contemporary version, the story of Street Art sometimes seems familiar.
Flashback to the Impressionists
The Impressionists were the first artists to go out into the field, abandoning their studios and comforts to paint exclusively "sur le motif[1] ". By changing their environment, artists imposed new constraints on themselves, and this undoubtedly led to new techniques. Painting must be done quickly if the artist is to capture the light as he looks at it. There was no time to mix colors on the palette, or even on the canvas. The term "Impressionism" was coined in 1874 in response to art critics' mockery of Monet's Impression, Soleil Levant. From the end of the 19th century onwards, after a difficult struggle, the break with academicism was gradually accepted. Critics began to understand and recognize the importance of this movement.
Certain echoes
"Exterior", "rapidity", "rupture" - can you now hear the echoes between the two movements? Indeed, graffiti artists also express themselves outdoors, with the difference that they don't paint "on the motif", but the motif directly. Their vandalism demands rapidity of gesture and technique. As for the rupture, graffiti is mostly seen as degradation, and the artists are treated as delinquents with illegitimate works unworthy of the art market, just as the Impressionists saw their painting qualified by institutions as "the drift of an unhealthy art".
The birth of Street Art
Born in the late 1960s as a simple form of tagging, the practice initially consisted of inscribing one's name on the walls and trains of New York to mark one's territory. As the number of tags multiplied, it became necessary to distinguish oneself with colors, ornamentation and a personal style, and tagging became graffiti. The practice of "style writing" began to emerge: letters were aestheticized to give them maximum allure. In the 1980s and 1990s, the movement took hold in France, transforming the initial writing into a logotype, with the image becoming stronger than the name. Techniques developed, and stencilled faces, collages, mosaics and more appeared on walls. The messages themselves expanded to include references to art history and the contemporary world.
In 2007, the term "Street Art" was coined to historicize the movement. It displeased graffiti artists as much as the term "Impressionism" displeased the movement's protagonists in the previous century.
From rejection to recognition
Street art is part of a constantly evolving culture that, over the past fifty years, has never ceased to grow richer. For many gallery owners, auctioneers and other players in the contemporary art world, not to take an interest at all would be a bit like making the same mistake with Impressionism, since the most hurtful thing for contemporary artists has always been their rejection by critics and institutions. Monet and Renoir lived long enough to gain recognition and have their works included in public collections.
Such is the case with some of today's street artists. In 2019, stencil artist C215 will see one of his works enter the permanent collection of Nice's Musée d'Art Moderne et d'Art Contemporain (MAMAC). Temporary exhibitions on the theme of urban art are also proliferating in national museums. As for Banksy, he is setting auction records. Already in 2018, the sensational and theatrical partial self-destruction of "Girl with Balloon" reached the record of 1.2 million euros, a record that will be smashed in October 2019 with the sale of "Parliament of the Apes", which fetched 11.1 million euros.
History is being made. We are fortunate to be living in the artistic movement of the 21st century, with the new generation of Monet and his friends before us.
[1 ] To paint "sur le motif" means to paint outdoors, in nature, in front of the subject (often a landscape). This notion was fundamental to the Impressionist movement. The introduction of paint tubes in 1841 enabled painters to move around more easily.
