Is the boundary between artistic creation and scientific research really as fixed as it seems? This ambitious essay maps the genuine points of contact between art and research, at a time when the figure of the "artist-researcher" is gaining ground in cultural institutions and practice-based doctorates are multiplying in French universities. Without naïveté, the authors distinguish a real cognitive ambition from mere institutional fashion, showing how artists and researchers each work to renew the way we understand and represent the world.