ARTISTE OUVRIER
Artiste-Ouvrier, pseudonym of Pierre-Benoît Dumont (born 1972) is a French painter and urban artist. Since 2000, he has made his works with stencil and aerosol bomb, mostly on walls but also on other media such as vinyl discs or wood panels. Before embracing the painter's career and adopting the stencil technique, Pierre-Benoît Dumont tried many fields. Author of poems and plays, he is also interested in cinema and comics. He began to practice stencil painting in 1993, but in 2000 he decided to devote himself to it and to take the name of "Artiste-Ouvrier". Three years later, together with Spliff Gâchétte, he organized the Internationale Pocheriste event in Nogent-sur-Marne, which involved the collaborative realization of a 69-metre-long mural with Yseult and Epsylon Point, among others. He will then take part in other legal initiatives of urban painting, such as the Stencil Project in 2004, which then brings together some of the greatest figures in Parisian street art, such as Blek le rat and Jef Aerosol. The following year, he participated in the exhibition "Urban Section" at the market of Blancs-Manteaux, in the fourth round of Paris, in the company of Ernest Pignon-Ernest, Speedy Graphito, Nemo, Jérôme Mesnager, Paella, Mosko and associates.. He is then contacted by Is Bach, future Js of JanaundJs, and 6lex, who want to learn from his technique pushed from the stencil. Their grouping marks the creation of the WCA, the Working Class Artist. At that time, Artist-Ouvrier left for Hamburg and this was the occasion for the WCA to welcome new artists, including Jana, a future member of JanaundJs, and to rename herself as WCA-ASA, for "Altona Stencil Art". In 2008, he was the guest of the annual Lezarts de la Bièvre event and made paintings in Paris' 5th and 13th arrondissements. In the same year, he was invited to London by Banksy as part of the Cans festival, along with internationally recognized artists such as Portuguese Vhils. Close to the stencil technique, Artiste-Ouvrier stencils contain a high level of detail and are frequently in colour. Unlike many other artists practicing color, he uses only two stencils for the same work but can nevertheless use up to 48 shades. It is influenced by the painting of the 19th century, notably by pre-Raphaelism or Art Nouveau.