The power and paradox of Pachter’s art is the way you sense a national character simply by standing in front of his work. In his iconoclastic visual metaphors I find myself luxuriating in their beauty and sensuality. I find new connections in their strange, jarring juxtapositions. Pachter’s creative impulse extends from finding, in the cultural heritage of his country, evidence of the fundamental stories that make us human: myths. For Pachter,  life has an operatic dimension. He has devoted his considerable skills to rocking his audiences with grand gesture, profound feeling, sensual overload, and glorious, splendid expressions of being human…"  Tom Smart, Saint John Telegraph Journal

"THE ARTIST WHO CREATED CANADA’S MODERN MYTHOLOGY: Renowned for his iconic renderings of the Canadian flag, the Queen astride a moose and cultural icons from Margaret Atwood to Pierre Trudeau, painter and printmaker Charles Pachter has himself become an icon of this country’s art scene. Over his 50-year career, his boldly graphic works and uncloying patriotism have presented a cheeky yet defining vision of Canada and its culture unlike any other." Betty Ann Jordan

  “With continuing grand gestures Pachter has staked out cultural territory of his own and celebrated it unabashedly… He is a serious minded humorist who possesses the gift to be roguish and poignant at once.” Bogomila Welsh-Ovcharov    

"Pachter’s works address larger concerns that speak to a wider audience than perhaps any other artist in Canada." Christopher Hume, Toronto Star  

"Ironical work that is both serious and self-parodying. Pachter works hard, even at the trivial. The paintings are beautiful in one way or another, like joke panels that take your breath away. These witty, occasionally dry images are more than urban jokes; they have emotional staying power. Pachter invades Pop culture with surreal wit. He sometimes paints as an insider to culture and at others like a true outcast. His work escapes a tendency towards intellectualism through the sheer power of talent and love of image.   David MacLean, Vancouver Sun  

"on se sent en présence d’un homme intelligent, cultivé et sensible qui nous fait découvrir des mondes insoupçonnés  à portée de la main. Pierre Karch, L’Express de Toronto  

"Charlie’s canvases are windows into the soul of Canada"   Marc Côté, Cormorant Books

SHORT BIO:  One of Canada’s leading contemporary artists, Charles Pachter is a painter, printmaker, sculptor, designer, historian, and lecturer. Born in Toronto, he studied art history at the University of Toronto, French literature at the Sorbonne, and painting and graphics at the Cranbrook Academy of Art in Michigan. His work has been exhibited at the Art Gallery of Ontario, the Royal Ontario Museum, and the McMichael Gallery. He is represented in public and private collections throughout Canada, and internationally. He has held solo exhibitions in France, Germany, Japan, the UK, and India. He worked at Expo 67 in Montreal supervising the installation of 60 contemporary sculptures from around the world. He taught printmaking at the University of Calgary in 1969-70. He spearheaded Toronto’s Queen Street West revival in the 1970s and 80s by restoring 20 old buildings into facilities for arts usage. He is an Officer of the Order of Canada, a Chevalier of France’s Order of Arts and Letters, holds honorary doctorates from Brock University, OCAD University, and the University of Toronto where he is a Senior Fellow at Massey College.  He is a recipient of the Queen’s Golden and Diamond Jubilee medals. His images of the queen, moose, and maple leaf flag are icons of Canadian contemporary art. McClelland & Stewart publications include an illustrated book on his life and work, and The Journals of Susanna Moodie, his celebrated collaboration with poet Margaret Atwood. His murals of Hockey Knights in Canada can be seen in Toronto’s College Subway Station. Mr. Pachter lives and works in downtown Toronto in an award-winning studio designed by Canadian architect Stephen Teeple. His work is on permanent display in his adjoining Moose Factory Gallery. In summer he paints in a waterfront studio converted from a 1920s ice storage depot on Lake Simcoe. His paintings are in the Portrait Gallery of Canada, the Canadian Embassy in Washington, Canada House in London, the Parliament Buildings, the Prime Minister’s residence, and the Embassy of France in Ottawa. Pachter’s steel and granite moose sculptures have been installed across Canada. His best selling children’s books, M is for Moose, and Canada Counts, are published by Cormorant Books, Toronto.    

Twitter: CharlesPachter1

Sara Angel essay on Charles’ early work    http://bit.ly/THf3te 

Prince Phillip & Lt Gov David Onley view my print of Prince Edward visiting John Graves Simcoe in Niagara, 1792

Solo Exhibition at the ART GALLERY OF SUDBURY, runs through to June 15, 2013

      
"Pebbles", lithograph and poem from the limited edition  Atwood-Pachter folio EXPEDITIONS, 1966                      

CLICK ON IMAGE  TO ENLARGE
Jan 2013 – Painting Ojibwa Chief Yellowhead at the Narrows, Orillia circa 1830     

New studio  MOFO  – Moose Factory of Orillia

LAUGHING MONARCHS 2008, collection Art Gallery, University of Alberta, Edmonton

 
DECISIONS DECISIONS 2012

KISS ME KATE

Click on image to enlarge   

Charles with artists Joanne Tod and Kent Monkman at the opening of his show 1812: THE ART OF WAR 

Click  http://on.fb.me/KDzju6  for pictures of Opening,  May 23 2012   

 

Queen delighted with Pachter’s Diamond Jubilee gift sculpture, "Mooseplunge"

 

FASCINATOR RHYTHM 2011          

CANADIAN TIRE 2012

Some suggestions for Diamond Jubilee stamps featuring Charles’ paintings of the Queen over the last 40 years 

Noblesse Oblige 1972

Rite de Passage 1973

The Visitation, 1972  

    
Prince Edward, father of Queen Victoria,  visits John Graves Simcoe in Niagara, 1792[

           
PICASSO’S KATE? "Une Demoiselle du Canada",  2011                

PACHTER HALL & MOOSE FACTORY 22 Grange Ave, Toronto M5T1C7  Open by appointment 416 260 1600  mobile 647 239 1700     pachterc@gmail.com  

               
Roof deck and Moose Sculpture overlooking city skyline from Pachter Hall

 Virtual Tour of Pachter Hall

HIGHNESSES-IN-TRAINING GREET MONARCH OF THE NORTH,
inkjet and acrylic on canvas, 2011

           
HAT CHECK, inkjet and acrylic on canvas,  2011

        
      In the studio, May 1981

Five paintings from the inaugural exhibition THE PAINTED FLAG, Nov 1981 now hang in the Parliament Buildings in Ottawa  

Installation of Inaugural Exhibition, 567 Queen St W, Toronto 1981

Original Exhibition poster from 1981

      
"ARISE", poster for WORD ON THE STREET, national book & magazine fair, 2009 

                 
PACHTER HALL, acrylic on canvas panels for College subway mural HOCKEY KNIGHTS IN CANADA,  Les Rois de l’Arène, 1984

MOOSEPLUNGE 2000, PAINTED FIBERGLASS, CITY HALL PLAZA, TORONTO  

Charles installs his painting BLINDVIEW, acrylic on  canvas (1984) in a residence on Eight Mile Point, Lake Simcoe, Ontario in 2010  

SIDE BY SIDE, acrylic on canvas, 2001   BENEDICTION 2003

WHOSE SARI NOW, acrylic on canvas 2005

CONCLUSION, acrylic & pastel on canvas, 2007

MOOSE LAKE PAS DE DEUX, acrylic & inkjet on canvas 2009  

BALACLAVA-BURQA, acrylic and pencil on canvas, 2007      

ARE WE NOT AMUSED, 2010