Created as an outsider art workshop by both patients and visitors over a thirty-year period, 8000 pieces currently occupy 1500 m2 of Ward 53 within the former Maison Blanche hospital building. These singular works, part and parcel of our collective memory, have been showcased at numerous outside exhibitions: today they are endangered. The hospital has been sold to a real-estate developer who is exerting pressure on the city of Neuilly-sur-Marne to free the premises.  April 3rd saw the hospital staff throw away a first pile of works into a dump truck, inspiring the creation of a support group appealing to the public authorities.

Vidéo You Tube :https://youtu.be/Zqlz4LorcPg

It was back in 1983 that Christian Sabas, a nurse in the Maison Blanche hospital psychiatric ward, but also a painter and musician, opened a creative art workshop—L'ATELIER DU NON FAIRE [the no doing workshop]—with the support of several members of the hospital administration. It became a venue for one and all to come paint, make music or simply hang out. During all these years, the ATELIER has represented a space of freedom and creation that has proven both beneficial and prolific. Indeed, numerous publications, press reviews, films. books and CDs have praised the workshop's activity. Unfortunately however, in 2005 Maison-Blanche closed down in the face of a growing number of small care units throughout Paris. At first, the ATELIER was relocated in a series of just such small Parisian structures to which Christian Sabas was successively assigned, before he was ultimately asked to put an end to his activity. Although officially a pensioner by now, Christian Sabas continues to animate the ATELIER thanks to various exhibitions, events and concerts. Sadly, the negotiations undertaken to date with the City Council of Neuilly-sur-Marne, the developer (AFTRP) and the next door psychiatric hospital (Ville-Evrard), with an eye to housing and preserving the ATELIER's holdings, have not led to any results. Presently—having undertaken various initiatives to no avail, and given its lack of  sufficient funds and support—the association finds itself unable to save these works.

Press kit :http://atelierdunonfaire.com/infos/dossiers/

Virtual guided tour of L’ATELIER :http://www.atelierdunonfaire.com/visite-non-faire/ 

Web site :http://www.atelierdunonfaire.com

Email : [email protected]