Art has the ability not only to represent reality but also to shape and give form to it. From novels to painting and direct creative interventions, imaginative renderings of the city enact and render glimpses of urban futures in the present. This debate proposes to explore the relation between urban art and urban futures. We ask: Can creative practice work to prefigure urban life? How can practitioners working towards constructing urban futures benefit from the representational and imaginative powers of creative engagements with the city? What are the points of interface where creative practitioners can assist in shifting material realities? More broadly, are artistic interventions bounded by the relation between beautification and gentrification? Can this dichotomy be exploded by urban art?