"Visages d'Altitude"

A magnificent tribute to the guiding fraternity by artist Pascal Amblard

Galvanized by the Bicentenary of the Chamonix Guides' Company, Pascal Amblard pays tribute to mountain guides across the centuries with 52 remarkable portraits (drawing in mixed techniques) ranging from the 1700s to today. These  "Visages d'Altitude" have been edited into a superb book, and each portrait is accompanied by a vivid and beautifully written text. The book is on sale and on order at the Loic Lucas gallery in Chamonix.

Visit the art gallery

^{Front cover: Armand Charlet (1900-1925)}

^{Claude Jaccoux, a pioneering spirit and  the most senior member of the Compagnie des Guides}

^{Fanny Tomasi-Schmutz, one of the 6 female guides, members of the Compagnie de Chamonix}

^{Vivian Bruchez, guide and steep skier}

Born in 1961, Pascal Amblard describes himself as a figurative painter, whose first aesthetic emotion was experienced at the age of 8 years during a holiday in the Mont Blanc region. From that day onwards and in his own words, he feels especially at home in view of snow-capped peaks and high altitudes!

"I have always had a fascination with the representation of our world. Drawing and painting are for me ways of getting closer to its beauty and its mystery. They plunge me deeper into the mystery.
Sharing is part of the whole process. Each spectator of one of my paintings is a new consciousness, a new emotional reaction to the landscape that I have seen and painted."

^{Oil on pannel}

His encounter with the arts first took the form of a deep passion for decorative painting. His activity as a panoramic painter began modestly in 1988, in the Savoy region, and gradually developed and matured.

In 1990, a newly opened gallery in Paris, specializing in trompe l'oeil, entrusted him with all their orders for murals and frescoes. From 1992 came a period largely devoted to the teaching of painting in Paris. When the academy in which he taught reached international fame, he decided to take a new direction.

^{Plafond Baroque - New York}

He rapidly specialized in a style inspired by the old masters, ranging from Renaissance art to the 18th century. He sold his work on all five continents, integrated an international group of decorative painters, and was invited to teach in the United States, Sweden, Italy and Belgium.

^{Villa Claudinon - France}

Pascal Amblard considers this autodidact's journey, inspirited by great artists, to be a part of his apprenticeship. At the end of the initiation is the patiently nurtured desire to paint mountains and their astonishing beauty.

But the natural and sublime beauties are a formidable challenge for the painter. It therefore took Pascal Amblard nearly thirty years of intense work to feel ready to take on such artistic expression.

^{Sunset on the Aiguille Verte - Chamonix valley}

Since 2014, Pascal Amblard exhibits his work exclusively at the Loic Lucas art gallery in Chamonix.

Visit the art gallery

^{Scottish landscape}