MEETING WITH LIONEL SABATTÉ 
EXHIBITION “AN UNDERGROUND DESIRE”

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During my visit to Saint-Cirq-Lapopie, at the Maison Daura, and at the Maison des arts de Cajarc for the opening, I highly appreciated Lionel Sabatté's solo double exhibition, entitled Un désir souterrain (A Subterranean Desire).

Conceived in resonance with his artistic research residencies in the Quercy region and his visits to the Pech Merle cave, this project demonstrates the extent to which contemporary wildlife art can reinvent itself through matter. Here, figuration does not stem from academic drawing, but from a genuine sedimentation of components. A fascinating work on perception and texture.

Pelages Series, 2026, woven wool and mixed media (wool threads, oil, and walnut stain), 200 x 200 cm

2026, woven wool and mixed media (wool threads, oil, and walnut stain), 200 x 200 cm

As soon as you enter the exhibition room of the Center for Contemporary Art in Cajarc, your eyes are drawn to large-format pieces. The technical analysis of these works reveals a rigorous process.

The artist uses a woven wool support that he saturates with walnut stain. This natural pigment creates shades of ochre and earthy depths that recall the patina of rock walls. Wool threads and oil applied in relief structure the surface. These dark networks function as lines of force, evoking roots or organic flows. It is the exact distribution of these light and dark masses that triggers structural pareidolia. The silhouette is not outlined by a stroke; it emerges from the raw confrontation of materials.

On the walls of the Maison Daura, the contrast with the framed works of great lightness is striking. What one might mistake from a distance for a charcoal drawing is in reality a drawing made with sheep's hair.

Lionel Sabatté arranges fine filaments of local wool on the paper. Through a millimeter-precise layout of these volatile fibers, a silhouette appears. The form is literally born from the animal matter itself, playing with an economy of means to suggest the animal.

On the floor, one of his famous wolf sculptures inhabits the space. 

The fabrication process is unique: the artist agglomerates residual materials, dust, and fabric lint collected in the Châtelet-Les Halles metro station in Paris. The result gives a compact, rough, and crumbly appearance, close to a geological concretion. Seized in a dynamic posture, like this wolf howling at the light, these volumes seem extracted from the depths of the ground.

This exhibition succeeds in proving that in wildlife art, evocation can be more powerful than simple description. By using sheep's hair, dust, or walnut stain, Lionel Sabatté creates a terrain favorable to the discovery of forms and volumes. It is our own brain that, faced with the accuracy of his textures, reconstitutes the presence of the living. A strong and mastered artistic approach, to be discovered in Cajarc and Saint-Cirq-Lapopie.