Invader (artist)

Invader is the pseudonym of a French urban artist, born in 1969, whose work is modelled on the crude pixellation of 1970s–1980s 8-bit video games. He took his name from the 1978 arcade game Space Invaders, and much of his work is composed of square ceramic tiles inspired by video game characters. Although he prefers to remain incognito, and guards his identity carefully, his distinctive creations can be seen in many highly-visible locations in more than 65 cities in 33 countries. He documents each intervention in a city as an "Invasion", and has published books and maps of the location of each of his street mosaics.

In addition to working with tiles, Invader is one of the leading proponents of indoor mosaics created using stacks of Rubik's Cubes in a style he refers to as "Rubikcubism". He is also known for his QR code mosaic works.

Invader is a graduate of the École des Beaux-Arts, a Parisian art school, though he tells interviewers he attended a tiling school on Mars. Invader initially derived inspiration for his creations from video games from the late 1970s to early 1980s that he played when he was growing up, particularly characters from Space Invaders, from which he derived his work name. Games of the era were constructed with 8-bit graphics, and so lend themselves well to the mosaic treatment, with each tile representing one pixel. Invader likes tiles for their robustness and permanence. Invader's first mosaic was installed in the mid 1990s in his home city. It was a sleeper for several years before the full "invasion" programme was conceived in 1996.

In this project, the idea is to bring the virtual world into reality. One can see many things in it, but it refers to the early days of digital and the video game.

The first wave of "invasion" began with his home city in 1998, and then spread to 31 other cities in France. Since then, Invader's works have appeared in 60 cities in 30 countries around the world. He has invaded New York five times, and Hong Kong on three separate occasions. He has tagged historic buildings and other locations. One of the more prominent places where the mosaics have been installed is on the Hollywood Sign. The first was placed on the letter D on 31 December 1999 to mark the Y2K bug. During subsequent trips to Los Angeles, Invader placed mosaics on the eight other letters of the sign.

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