In a wild and unspoiled valley of the Cévennes d'Ardèche, the Sentier des Lauzes is a hiking trail punctuated by installations by renowned artists which opens onto grandiose landscapes of nature and rural heritage.
The slate path is a path of hiking which forms a loop of 5h in the towns of Dompnac and Saint-Mélany, with branches towards the neighbouring towns of Beaumont, Valgorge, Sablières, Saint-André Lachamp and Ribes. All along the trail, you will admire the beautiful landscapes of the Drobie Valley, its architecture, its heritage revealed and highlighted by artists and creators.
This trail will make you think about the fragility of this territory.
A path of consciousness
In the Cévennes d'Ardèche, the roofs of the Cévennes farmhouses are covered with schist stones called lauzes. This lauze gave rise to a path called "Le sentier des lauzes".
Your senses awakened
Works punctuate the path: Belvedere of the lichens, Words of Lauzes, Oto Date, The silence of the Lauzes, The flutes of the king trees… The association has chosen to speak and reinventing the landscape through the eyes of artists or designers.
Who knows, you might meet an artist in residence!
Inspiration and creation: the escape
Nestled on a formerly cultivated southern slope, l'Échappée reinvents agricultural heritage by transforming terraces and a barn into a garden refuge. This belvedere open to the valley combines controlled vegetation and lush chestnut groves, offering a subtle play between shadow and light. Theworkshop-refuge, stripped down to the essentials, erases the boundary between interior and exterior, inviting a sensitive immersion in the landscape. More than a place, the Échappée is a parenthesis, a space for contemplation and creation.
Created in 2001, the association Sur le sentier des Lauzes was "born from a group of residents who wanted to explore the possible future of their living environment in the Drobie valley"
The fruit of a reflection
In order to feed their reflections, they then called upon people from elsewhere: artists, writers, historians, musicians, botanists who, through "their perspectives, their creativity, invent innovative scenarios." Through meetings and exchanges, the works have thus spread over this cultural circuit which draws a 15 km loop between Saint-Mélany and Dompnac. The famous landscaper, writer and gardener Gilles Clément designed Le lichen lookout who organizes a lookout. Further on, the sculptures by Christian Lapie, cut from blackened trunks, burned by fire, affirm the precariousness of these landscapes sensitive to fires.
The carved slates by Mexican Domingo Ciscneros pay homage to the know-how of the ancients. Like eyes, the small inlaid mirrors by German Yan Kopp on an old mill, an arch, rocks, fragment the landscape and question us in passing. The works question the visitor on the concrete issues of these valleys subject to the mutations of the modern world. interventions, concerts, storytelling walks, theatrical performances occasionally come to nourish this view of the landscape.
Interview by Séverine Baur.
