Pascal Chôve

Pascal Chôve was born on 17 February 1960 in Saint-Nazaire. Pascal Chôve began drawing at the age of six. But his first big flash was the impressionists. At the Jeu de Paume in Paris, there was this self-portrait of Van Gogh. I found it sublime. I cried... Stupidly." Then comes the American hyperrealism of the 1970s and 1980s. «I felt that this painting suited me». The themes less. «I wanted to detach myself from the leitmotiv of the consumer society or cars». Pascal Chôve then embarked on «dilapidated architectures, disused factories where nature takes over». Gradually, the human presence is intruding into the canvases. After a period focused on men, the painter turns to the female figure, «as counter-foot of reality, which can be brutal». The stillness of her paintings is evident. "The round curves of women have nothing to do with male musculature." The light, «natural, never frank, almost a chiaroscuro», intensifies this sensation, applied to soft colours in half-shade. The bodies, always very realistic, contrast with the blurred background. A Mediterranean landscape, an old door about to fall apart, a mural. The painting becomes physical matter, a raised and curved relief. «A painting is looked at in 3D!». Today, Pascal Chhove does not imagine going towards the abstract. «The figurative is coming back, galleries for example are exhibiting more and more photographs». Whatever the medium, the human body attracts. "We have never gone around it, each character is new. I always try to go further, to dig into new techniques." The works of Pascal Chôve are part of large private collections around the world.