Naïve art and art brut need space! The Cécile Sabourdy museum is expanding

The Vicq-sur-Breuilh museum dedicated to naive art will soon take on a new dimension. Major extension work is underway, new exhibition rooms, a third venue, a winter garden. Victim of its success, the Haut-Vienne museum has been enriched with new donations, which it cannot currently exhibit due to lack of space.

There is excitement in the small village of Vicq-sur-Breuilh, in Haute-Vienne. The excavators have taken possession of the Cécile Sabourdy museum. For around ten years, the town has lived to the rhythm of this exhibition venue.

At the end of 2024, major work has been undertaken to expand it. The museum space will always be devoted to extraordinary art. The mworn Cécile Sabourdy presents since 2014 exhibitions dedicated to unclassifiable practices, shown in a former 17th century presbytery.

He addresses various subjects through paintings, drawings, engravings, sculptures and even tapestries which are regularly presented to the public. But thehe collections of naive art and outsider art feel cramped in the 600 square meters, donations have poured in, the museum cannot exhibit all the works it has in reserve.

In reserve, we have a lot of works that the public cannot see, because there is not enough space available. We are going to double the capacity of the museum!

Stéphanie Birembaut

Director of the museum Cécile Sabourdy

This Public Establishment for Cultural Cooperation offers permanent and temporary exhibitions which bring together self-taught and professional artists, from different geographical and temporal horizons, thematically.

After completion of the work, the surface area of ​​the museum will double and increase to 1200 square meters, a room will be dedicated to outsider art, a shared office space (third place) will be set up, but also larger reserves will be created in an 18th century building which was abandoned. It will soon be completely renovated, with biosourced materials.

This imposes stricter conservation standards, but this label will also make it possible to finance this work, thanks to the Ministry of Culture.

A winter garden will also be created on the rear facade of the museum and additional buildings which belong to the municipality of Vicq-sur-Breuilh will benefit from this major renovation. Former cellars will be transformed into exhibition or meeting places.

These major rehabilitation works are being undertaken, in the heart of the town of Vicq-sur-Breuilh, for an amount of 1.7 million euros, mainly financed by the Ministry of Culture. During the work, the Cécile Sabourdy museum remains open to the public, every weekend and during the week during the end-of-year holidays. Bringing art to life in rural areas while preserving heritage is the ambition of the Cécile Sabourdy museum.