Tribute to Postman Cheval

A wheelbarrow is the star of Tribute to Postman Cheval, created following a concert by CharlElie Couture in 2008, at the Ideal Palace. Positioned inside the palace, Postman Cheval's wheelbarrow is the centerpiece of the building. Without it, he would not have been able to collect the famous stones for his naive deconstruction. In Tribute to Postman Cheval, the tool is used to transport a piece of architecture bearing a strong resemblance to the Ideal Palace. Hints of scratchy lines around the wheel give a sense of forward movement, as if the work had been brought to us, as if it needed to discover the world. Black marks outline a silhouette sketched with the letters Cheval—the name of the person behind this labor of love. Seul au Monde (Alone in the World) is also written at the top of the piece, as a reminder of not only the solitary nature of the artist's work but also the lack of recognition of his genius during his lifetime. In a letter written to the regional archivist André Lacroix in 1897, Postman Cheval said he was planning to name his monument Seul au Monde. The world's detritus—and the main components of his dream—the stones anchored the postman in an alternate reality. Precisely by creating his world, he successfully escaped solitude by inviting travelers and the curious to discover his notion of ideal.