. photo @Fabienne Cresens
(English version see lower)
Musique : 1. Henry Cow : Beautiful as the Moon ( In Praise of Learning)
2. Gong : You can't kill me ( Camembert Electrique)
3. Pink Floyd : Remember a Day ( A Saucerful of Secrets)
Jean-François Perroy, plus connu sous le pseudonyme Jef Aérosol, né à Nantes le 15 janvier 1957, est un artiste pochoiriste français issu de la première vague de "street art" (art urbain) des années 80.
Il peint son premier pochoir à Tours en 1982. Il reste l'un des pionniers et chefs de file de cet art éphémère. De nombreux artistes plus jeunes se réclament de son influence.
Jef crée souvent des portraits de personnalités comme Elvis Presley, Gandhi, Lennon, Hendrix,Basquiat, Amalia Rodrigues, Dylan... mais une grande partie de son travail est consacrée aux anonymes de la rue : musiciens, passants, mendiants, enfants dont il peint les silhouettes grandeur nature, en noir et blanc, toujours soulignées de sa fameuse et mystérieuse flèche rouge, seconde signature et "marque de fabrique" de l'artiste.
Jef Aérosol a laissé sa trace sur les murs de nombreuses villes : Paris, Lille, Lyon, Nantes, île de Ré, Orléans, Tours, Londres, Lisbonne, Madrid, Barcelone, Venise, Rome, Amsterdam, Chicago, San Francisco, Los Angeles, New-York, Bruxelles, Zurich, Pékin, Tokyo, Palerme, Dublin, Belfast, Ljubljana, Athènes, La Réunion... Il a même collé son désormais légendaire "sitting kid" sur la Grande Muraille de Chine.
Ses travaux sont visibles dans de nombreuses expositions, festivals, art-fairs, ventes publiques et évènements internationaux, et il est représenté par plusieurs galeries en France et à l'étranger.
Il a réalisé une fresque sur la façade du musée Robert Musil à Klagenfurt (Autriche), en novembre 2012. Sa présence muséale a également été appréciée au Musée des Avelines (Saint-Cloud) où une importante exposition personnelle lui a été consacrée en 2011 et au Palais des Beaux Arts de Lille où un polyptique de ses oeuvres a été présenté lors de l'exposition "Babel" (2012).
Il a également été invité par l'ambassade de France à Tokyo, pour participer à la prestigieuse manifestation "no Man's Land" (nov 2009 - fev 2010), en compagnie de nombreux artistes japonais et français, dont Monsieur Chat, Speedy Graphito, Christian Boltanski, Claude Lévêque et Georges Rousse.
En 2012, Jef Aérosol célèbre ses 30 ans de pochoir ! A cette occasion, la galerie Magda Danysz (Paris - Shangaï) a organisé hors les murs une grande exposition rétrospective à Orléans, dans un lieu magnifique : la Collégiale Saint Pierre Le Puellier (juin-juillet 2012).
En 2011, Jef a réalisé à Beaubourg (Paris) son plus grand pochoir à ce jour (350 m2), intitulé "Chuuuttt !!!" et situé au coeur de la capitale, place Stravinski, face à la fameuse fontaine Jean Tinguely - Nikki de St Phalle et tout près du Centre Georges Pompidou.
Jef Aérosol est à l'origine de l'exposition "Dites 33", hommage aux pochettes d'albums vinyls 33 tours, rassemblant une centaine d'artistes, qui tourna de 2005 à 2009 en divers lieux de France et Belgique
Il a publié un livre aux éditions Alternatives en 2007 : VIP Very Important Pochoirs et un ouvrage sur Jef, dans la série "Opus Délit" : Jef Aérosol, risque de rêves (éditions Critères), est sorti en septembre 2010. En janvier 2011, un catalogue de l'exposition "Jef Aérosol fait un carton à Saint-Cloud" est édité par le Musée des Avelines, préfacé par Ernest Pignon-Ernest. En 2012, une ré-édition augmentée de cet ouvrage est sortie à l'occasion des 30 ans de pochoir de Jef. Un beau livre de 250 pages "Parcours Fléché" est sorti début 2013 aux éditions Gallimard / Alternatives. Il retrace 30 ans de la carrière de Jef. Une ré-impression de cet ouvrage sort en janvier 2014.
En outre, C'est Jef qui avait donné son titre et réalisé la couverture du tout premier livre sur les pochoirs de rue : Vite Fait, Bien Fait (éditions Alternatives / Agnès B, 1986).
Depuis, Il figure dans de nombreuses publications (françaises et étrangère) concernant le street art et l'art du pochoir.
Jef Aérosol a participé au film de Nicolas Engel, La Copie de Coralie.
Un film de 26 minutes réalisé par Manuela Dalle, tourné en 2009 et diffusé sur Arte en 2010, dans la série "l'Art et La manière" est consacré à son travail et à ses influences.
Jef a réalisé une grande fresque décor à Bruxelles pour le film de Martin Provost avec Yolande Moreau "Où va la nuit ?" tourné en France et Belgique en avril/mai 2010.
Il a aussi fait l'objet de nombreuses vidéos et sujets TV, tant en France qu'à l'étranger.
Egalement musicien, Jef a joué, tourné et enregistré avec divers groupes (Windcatchers, Open Road, Distant Shores...)
Jean-François Perroy, better known under the pseudonym Jef Aérosol, was born in Nantes (France) on January 15th 1957. He's a French urban stencil artist, a main proponent of the first generation of street artists who started working on the streets in the early 80s.
Jef Aérosol has been living and working in Lille (in the North of France) since 1984 but his works are exhibited worldwide.
He spraypainted his very first stencil in Tours (Central France) in 1982. He was a pioneer of what is now called "urban art" and he remains a reference and an influence among street artists of the younger generations.
Jef often paints celebrities and icons such as Elvis Presley, Gandhi, Lennon, Hendrix, Basquiat, Amalia Rodrigues, Dylan...
But a very important part of his work is also devoted to the anonymous characters of the street : buskers, passers-by, beggars, kids, elderlies, ordinary people...
Jef Aérosol has left his mark on the walls of numerous cities around the world : Paris, Lille, Lyon, Nantes, île de Ré, Orléans, Tours, London, Lisbon, Barcelona, Athens, Venice, Rome, Amsterdam, Chicago, New-York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Brussels, Zurich, Beijing, Tokyo, Palermo, Dublin, Belfast, Ljubljana... He even pasted-up his famous "Sittin'Kid" stencil on the Great Wall of China !
Jef's works can be seen in many exhibitions, group and solo shows, festivals, art-fairs, auction sales and international events. He is represented by several galleries in France and abroad.
Jef painted a stencilled mural on the Robert Musil Museum in Klagenfurt (Austria) in November 2010.
He was also invited by the French Embassy in Tokyo and participated in "No Man's Land", a very successful and highly prestigious event, along with many French and Japanese artists such as Speedy Graphito, Christian Boltanski, Claude Lévêque, Georges Rousse and so many more...
Jef Aérosol's famous and somewhat mysterious red arrow appears on all his works and has become some sort of a trademark, or second signature. Jef sometimes gives his own explanations but he prefers the people to come up with their own interpretations and feelings about the arrow !
Jef Aérosol was the organizer of a group show called "Dites 33", a tribute to the covers of those good old vinyl 33rpm albums (he collects them !). The exhibition gathered 100 artists (and about 1000 pieces !) and travelled in France and Belgium between 2005 and 2009.
Jef released a book in 2007 : "VIP Very Important Pochoirs" (Editions Alternatives, Paris) and another one in September 2010 : "Jef Aérosol, risque de rêves" (éditions Critères, collection Opus Délits). In January 2011, the catalogue of his show at the Musée des Avelines (Saint Cloud) was issued, with a foreword by legendary artist Ernest Pignon-Ernest. A bigger book "Parcours Fléché" (Gallimard / Alternatives Editions) was released in March 2013 and re-printed in January 2014 : it's a beautiful 250 page book about Jef's 30 year career.
Jef was the one who made the cover and gave its title to the very first book ever published about street stencils :Vite Fait, Bien Fait (éditions Alternatives / Agnès B, 1986).
Since then, lots of articles have been written about him and he has been featured in numerous publications (French and foreign) about stencil and street art.
A 26 minute film by Manuela Dalle was shot in 2009 and broadcast on German/French TV channel Arte :"Jef Aérosol : l'Art et la Manière". Jef also participated in "La Copie de Coralie", a film by young French filmmaker Nicolas Engel. Many videos and TV reports have also shown Jef and his works, nationally and internationally.
In May 2010, Jef Aérosol painted a huge mural setting in Brussels for Martin Provost's next movie "Où va la nuit..." featuring Belgian star Yolande Moreau. (Martin's previous film "Séraphine", with Yolande, won 7 Cesars in 2009)
Also a musician, Jef has played, toured and recorded with several bands (Windcatchers, Open Road, Distant Shores...)
JEF AEROSOL
A true originator who helped spark what is now known as “Street Art” when he sprayed his first stencil series across the city of Tours, France one night in 1982, the self-taught Jef Aerosol has continuously rocked the streets with his oversized portraits and helped define a new public art nomenclature with other French artists like Blek Le Rat, Miss Tic, and Speedy Graphito.
Steadily from the ’80s to the ’10s Aerosol has cut and sprayed stunning portraits of his heroes; cultural icons who stand undiminished by the hype. They connect directly with the masses and shake public opinion with humor and provocation; Strummer, Cash, Vicious, Hendrix, Bowie, Bardot, Cobain, Lennon, Smith, Jagger – all brainy agitators and vixens cut and sprayed in stark layers of black, grey and white. And each with Jef Aerosol’s signature hot red arrows affixed nearby for exclamation.
In Street Art and in the gallery, Jef Aerosol has not purely focused on those well-known personages. Among the faces you’ll find a number of self-portraits and portrayals of the more anonymous among us such as those living and working in the streets.
Like the best photographers, Aerosol catches the instant of truth in his portraits, and reveals a universal humanity in each subject. “In my work I love to call up my feelings and emotions to honor these modern day heroes who have fed my life with their music, art and ideas. This new show is a powerful and vivid collection of these inspirations that I am really excited to bring to New York for the first time," says Jef Aerosol about his solo show at Ad Hoc Gallery, in Brooklyn.
Three decades of getting up on walls in cities including Paris, London, Lisbon, Chicago, New York, Bejing, Venice, Amsterdam, Rome, Zurich, Berlin, Dublin, and Tokyo have given him all the “street cred”Jef Aerosol will ever need.
Sighted in numerous books and by lots of authors, blogs like Wooster Collective and Brooklyn Street Art, and newspapers like The New York Times as one of the lynchpins in the stencil art movement that came to be called “street art”, Jef Aerosol’s work has become a perennial favorite of collectors. His work resides in hundreds of private collections, has exhibited in numerous galleries in Europe, the U.S. and Australia (list below), and is regularly auctioned with Bonhams (London, New-York), Artcurial (Paris), Drouot (Paris), and Dreweats (London).
In 2007 Jef Aerosol published a gallery of portraits in VIP Very Important Pochoirs (éditions Alternatives, Paris, 2007).
Galleries where the work of Jef Aerosol has been shown include: Galerie Brugier-Rigail (Paris), Galerie Raison d'Art (Lille), Signal Gallery (London), Zozimus Gallery (Dublin), Art Partner Galerie (Brussels), Galerie Anne Vignial (Paris), Galerie Storme (Lille), Galerie Onega (Paris), Carmichael Gallery (Los Angeles), ATM Gallery (Berlin), and Famous When Dead Gallery (Melbourne).
Stephen Harrington (BrooklynStreetArt.com), 2009
Jef Aerosol is a legend of Street Art. He started stencils in 1982 in France. With other French artists like Blek Le Rat, Miss Tic, and Speedy Graphito, he has pioneered a new way of artistic expression - breaking the limits of gallery spaces and canvas format. Streets have become a free and open exhibition arena.
Jef Aerosol initially explored ‘copy-art’ in the late 70s, i.e. creating collages and distortions of photos using all the possibilities of a photocopier. He gradually moved to stencils, influenced by 70s-80s underground rock bands. Characters are the focal point of Jef Aerosol’s art. Whether they are cultural icons or anonymous people, their attitudes carry a genuine emotion, magnified by texture effects, contrasted colours and provoking wording. Jef Aerosol masters the use of stencil. Like the best photographers, he can catch the truth of an instant to reveal its universality.
Caroline Leluel (French Art Studio, London)
Charlie Meehan (Zozimus Gallery, Dublin, Ireland)
http://www.jefaerosol.com/
Expo : Alteraction : solo "Extra Muros" 26/04/2014 - 18/05/2014 1E rue des Renards, 1000 Bruxelles
http://www.martineehmer.com/
Fabienne Cresens : http://www.picturelle.be/
TulipoMania
Hermanus Art Floral – à partir du 26 avril 2014
Chaussée de Waterloo, 68 A – 1060 Bruxelles
Ouverture
du mardi au samedi de 9h30 à 13h00 – 14h00 à à 18h30