A brief history of street art as a term up to 2000

Abstract

This working paper gathers the different understandings of the term “street art” found in books up to the turn of the millennium. Several opinions and theories about street art are nowadays proposed, often depending on working, cultural or geographical contexts. The idea of street art has also changed in the course of time. By a chronological analysis of the most important meanings referencing the word, the study outlines street art as a continuously changing term, with the purpose of providing an historical grounding to better frame the idea of street art today. The survey is conducted based on a literature search with the help of WorldCat (worldcat.org). The empirical material consists of printed books from 1950 to 2000 mentioning the term “street art” in their titles.