Gabriel Chabrat is a true Creusois and his Creuse, you could say he loves it. He loves its sometimes amazing landscapes like those of the Millevaches plateau. He loves his town, the one where he grew up, Felletin. He loves the winter when the snow falls on the bell towers and sprinkles the country with a white cotton coat. He loves above all what evokes his childhood… the fair, its smells and sounds. The taste of a candy apple. A wonderful Christmas with the glow of candles. The tables of guests, the laughter of men, the look of women. The window of the toy shop. The circus, its animals and its glitter.
Then life takes us along by the wayside. After the Beaux Arts, Paris… his quickly brought him back home, in Creuse because the world from elsewhere does not have the same flavor.
Gabriel Chabrat creates, creates and creates again. Forgetting the forms and the perspectives, it is his interior which expresses itself. The colors and the lines are posed, assembled, erased and reconstructed. Little by little, the work takes life and is composed. The superimpositions animate it, the characters are born, express themselves, transport us. The canvas is born internally but he offers the viewer to make his own interpretation.
In the late 1980s, the artist set out to paint the church in which he held summer exhibitions of his paintings and tapestries. He readily acknowledges his good fortune! What an opportunity to be able to express himself freely in such a volume! It is the Chabrat that everyone knows best: the murals of Sous-Parsat.
Beautiful encounters allow him to make the cartoons of the stained glass windows that extend the scenes. He will complete the whole by the vault in winter 1994-1995.
The colors and forms are strong and inevitably challenge the visitor. Everyone will draw from them, according to their convictions, their own strengths or energies. In this universe apart and out of time, it is possible to gather, to pray, to meditate on the world, its violence and its love, its passions and its dramas… Why not simply, let yourself be overwhelmed by the strength that emerges from the whole.
The church is only one facet the Work of Gabriel Chabrat, quite different from his usual productions to be discovered all summer in the gallery and all year round by appointment.
Painting Workshop
Gabriel Chabrat and Véronique Chabrat
Route d’Ahun 23150 SOUS PARSAT
As a guide, I give tours of the churches, villages and other historical and heritage sites in our area, always with great pleasure.
This church in Sous-Parsat with its contemporary paintings and stained glass windows has always seduced me and I didn’t even dare to imagine that one day I would be able to show it off.
Finally, the courage came… I asked Gabriel Chabrat if he would allow me to do so and if he would give me the keys of understanding and explain his approach. The answer came without any prior thought : “Of course and with joy !”
I officially became a guide of the frescoes and stained glass windows of the church of Sous-Parsat and I would gladly share this beautiful work with you.
Group visits and VIP visits on reservation at the tourist office 05.55.62.55.93 / 05.55.64.12.20.
