Che (bd) ehC

Che is the nickname I adopted from my family and is short for PatChe which in turn stands for Patrick Chevalier. It is a shortened anagram of my signature and my nickname.

It is one of the many pseudonyms I have adopted or have been given and that I have lived with over the years. I like these aliases because they allow me to reinvent myself and compartmentalize facets of my self.

PatChe is representative of an artist who enjoys illustrative arts, comics, graphic novels and literature. I decided to distinguish my art by persona and lend this name to represent Illustrative works and narratives because of the familiarity it evokes.

Illustration and comic art is a form of visual art that I truly respect and love. It remains in my opinion a most underappreciated form of art at least in the academic worldview; and yet it has touched many and has creeped up like ivy on its ivory tower. Populism art is a bastard and illustration is one of its children but it is only so because of the parent who failed to see it's child’s achievement.

From classic satirical cartoonist like George Cruikshank, Honoré Daumier, Toulouse Lautrec and poster artists such as Alphonse Mucha, to sci-fi and fantasy graphic artists like Jean-Claude Mezière, Inke Bilal, Brenie Rightson or cartoonists like André Franquin, Albert Uderzo or Bill Waterson there are just a few who come to mind when I think of its influence on me and on my work and that of countless others.

In this section you'll find sketches thoughts and works that for a lack of a better word is raw and childlike in form and in impulse. Born from a simple process and that is easily understood at least without too much preparation but that holds within its heart as profound a statement as one could find in 'capital "A"rt'.

The fist posting under the Nom de plume of PatChe will be the episodic and storyboard inspired works called Frame One and more recently it's offshootExit Strategy which relates to the same photo collage technique but in one-off creations.

Likely more series will follow.

Patrick Chevalier