Jef Aerosol

Born 1957. Lives and works in Lille, France.
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. He spraypainted his very first stencil in Tours (Central France) in 1982: a self portrait enlarged from a photobooth photo. 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. He 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. His 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 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!