Artistic Profile = Motor + Mean
The study of artistic practices presented in the book 600 démarches d'artistes shows that they can be classified into families of concerns — the Motors — and families of materialisation — the Means.
An artistic practice is defined as the association of one Motor and one Mean. This association, written as coordinates (for instance 21;15), constitutes the artist's Profile.
Each typology is organised in four levels of aggregation: three initial categories, subdivided in two at each level, lead to the twenty-four types. This is the canonical level, the one carried by every artist page.
Two further subdivisions form the refinement: within a single type, it distinguishes inflections shared by only a few artists. Beyond that, the singularity describes what belongs to one artist alone: two artists with the same canonical Profile part ways there.
The canonical may be set by the artist, who analyses their own work through the typology. A profile may also be certified: the analysis is then conducted by Maxime Chanson, from the works, from whatever comes from the artist — titles, writings, statements — and from comparison with all the artists already profiled. A certified profile is thereby comparable with every other certified profile. Refinement and singularity belong to certification.