Albert Frey

popular name: Ferdinand Cheval

date_of_death: August 19, 1924

age: 88

cause_of_death: Natural causes

claim_to_fame: Artists

best_know_for: Factuer Cheval was a French postman who spent thirty-three years of his life building Le Palais idéal (the "Ideal Palace") in Hauterives, France. The Palace is regarded as an extraordinary example of naïve art architecture. Upon completion in 1912 of his "dream palace" after 33 years of hard work, Cheval spent another 8 years building his tomb in the Parish cemetery. He died one year after the completion of his own tomb.

popular name: Hugo Pratt

date_of_death: August 20, 1995

age: 68

cause_of_death: Bowel cancer

claim_to_fame: Artists

best_know_for: Hugo Pratt is considered one of the greatest graphic novelists in the world. His strips, graphic works, and watercolors have been exhibited in major museums such as the Grand Palais and Pinacothèque in Paris, the Vittoriano in Rome, and Ca ‘Pesaro in Venice. Pratt was known for combining strong storytelling with extensive historical research on works such as Corto Maltese. From 1970 to 1984 Pratt lived in France where Corto Maltese was immensely popular where his comic book was published by the local publisher, Pif Gadget, and later translated in fifteen different languages. From 1984 to 1995 Pratt lived in Switzerland where the international success that Corto Maltese continued to grow. In France, most of his pre-Corto Maltese works were published in several album editions by publishers such as Casterman, Dargaud, and Humanoides Associés. Often referred to as "The Picasso of Comics" Pratt was inducted into the Will Eisner Award Hall of Fame in 2005.

popular name: Nusch Éluard

date_of_death: November 28, 1946

age: 40

cause_of_death: Stroke

claim_to_fame: Artists

best_know_for: Nicknamed “Nusch” by artist Max Bill, she was a French performer, model and surrealist artist. In 1930 she met the poet Paul Éluard working as a model. They married him in 1934. She produced surrealist photomontage and other works, and is the subject of “Facile,” a collection of Éluard’s poetry published as a photogravure book, illustrated with Man Ray’s nude photographs of her. Later she was the subject of several cubist portraits and sketches by Pablo Picasso in the late 1930s with whom she had an affair. Nusch worked for the French Resistance during the Nazi occupation of France during World War II and died suddenly in 1946 in Paris, collapsing in the street due to a massive stroke.