Published in the Daily Hampshire Gazette, March 9, 2007

I.D.Profile: Jean-Pierre Pasche

Jean-Pierre Pasche has a commitment to good art and to environmental protection. The owner of Eastmont Custom Framing and the Elusie Gallery in Easthampton, Pasche has been framing pictures and paintings since he first opened a shop in his native Switzerland over 20 years ago, and his appreciation for nature has been fired by travels across Asia and a 10,000-mile bicycle trip across Africa.

Pasche, who married a Holyoke woman in Switzerland and came to the United States in 1997, opened his Easthampton business in a converted gas station on Union Street in 2001. Today, though, he's settled in the city's old Town Hall and says the new location is a great place to be part of Easthampton's ever-growing arts scene.

Pasche has also started the Eastmont Art Fund, a fundraising operation to support local nonprofit organizations and the arts community. He draws the name of his business from Easthampton and his hometown of Montreux, Switzerland, where he once worked chauffeuring musicians like B.B. King and Wynton Marsalis to and from that city's famous jazz festival.

Full name: Jean-Pierre Pasche
People know you as: Jean-Pierre, J.P., Pierre (please, no Jean or John!)
Date and place of birth: June 8, 1957, Montreux, Switzerland
Address: Easthampton
Job: Owner of Eastmont Custom Framing and the Elusie Gallery
Who lives under the same roof as you? My beautiful daughters when they're not with their mom, Joanne, in Leeds
Children: Lucie, 15, and Elisa, 13
Education: Swiss education, probably equivalent to high school; also, became a certified industrial bookbinder in 1977
Pets: Mango, the orange tabby cat
Book you'd recommend to a friend: "Looking on Darkness," by Andre Brink
Favorite movie: I like offbeat movies like "Baghdad Cafe" and "Amelie" and early Costa-Gavras movies ("Z" or "The Confession") for their influence on my teenage years. Also saw "Diva" for about the eighth time a few days ago, I guess that makes it a favorite…
Favorite singer or group: I enjoy many different styles, from Cohen to Coldplay, and from Brahms to Brel ...
What do you waste your money on? Serving good cheese and good wine in real wine glasses at Elusie's gallery receptions. But I don't consider this a waste of money
Guilty pleasure: I drink Nestle's instant coffee instead of the organic fair-trade varieties, totally against my principles ...
Life-changing experience: I owe my life to Joanne who, early one morning in 1993, noticed I was having heart failure and was able to get emergency medical help in time. Since then I have been fully enjoying life, more or less trouble-free, with a pacemaker-defibrillator. Joanne: my gratitude, forever!
Funniest memory: Getting caught by some of my Dad's colleagues from the Montreux police when I was driving a Vespa without license plates and without a license. I thought it was funny, but my father was not impressed
Strangest job you ever held: That would have to be muleteer on hiking trips in the Swiss Alps
Bumper-sticker statement? "Recall Bush." I also like "Honor Mother Earth" except when it's on a car that's left running while the owner is shopping (a couple of weeks ago, at Cooper's Corner in Florence)
A little-known fact about you: I climbed Mount Kilimanjaro in Africa with my Dad when I was on my trans-African bicycle trip. An amazing achievement for my father, who was 60 at that time
One product, trend or fashion you'd like to see return: Ethics! In politics, in business, in the media. I'd like to be able to turn the TV on and not have to guess whether I'm watching news or if someone is trying to sell me something -- an idea, a product, a war ...
What really sets you off? Two things -- how this highly developed country still measures with feet and pounds, and people who think climate change is not their problem
Favorite Web sites: www.isc.ro for my gaming addiction; www.live365.com for its hundreds of commercial-free radio stations; but the top of the list is www.easthamptoncityarts.com, which explains why it is so exciting to be living and working in Easthampton
People who knew you in high school thought you were: Shy and the master of bad jokes (I haven't changed much ...)
Whom do you most admire? Mahatma Gandhi for his faith in the power of Satya (truth) and Ahimsa (nonviolence); my father for having raised his children alone, not an easy task being a full-time police officer
Parting shot: Honor Mother Earth, and please turn your engine off when you're not driving!

-- Compiled by Steve Pfarrer