In the office window, a beautiful model of a sardine fishing boat from the 1860s-1900s is proudly displayed. This model was made in the 2010s by the former fisherman's master Patrick Chever. Since he started modelling his first ship, a trawler from Concarneau, in 1967, his collection has grown to include around a hundred models of old ships from all over the world.

Patrick Chever works on his models from photographs, frescos and drawings. From these elements, he reconstitutes the plans of the ship, focusing on the details. His quest for authenticity continues in the search for the original wood in order to stick as closely as possible to the original ship. For this sardine boat, he used oak for the hull and chestnut for the ribs and floor. The yards are made of northern fir.

Everything is meticulously reproduced, including small parts of 3 to 4 millimetres. The model maker doesn't count the hours he works. He has created his own tools to work better and collects materials from shipyards.

The hull is painted black as a reminder of the use of tar as an exterior coating to make the ship watertight. This tar was commonly referred to as 'coltard'. The model also has two sails, a foresail in the front and a windvane in the middle. The rudder and centreboard are also in place.

The large boats shown in this model were generally 9 to 10 metres long. They were used in the spring for sardine and mackerel fishing from April to November. They then spent the winter stranded at the back of the port.

In the dining room of the former seaside villa of the Le Gall family, you will be able to admire two engravings in lino lost by the artist Guy Cosnard. The latter was the first president of the Friends of the Cannery Association from 2017 to 2019.

Retired from the hospital environment since 2014, he has been devoting his time to the plastic arts and engraving following a diploma obtained from the evening classes of the Beaux-Arts de Bruxelles in the early 2010s.

The artist's studio is based in Loctudy. He has installed a press there in order to make prints of his engravings. His favourite technique is linocut engraving, and more particularly the technique known as "lost lino" which consists of printing an engraving in several colours by keeping the same plate, hollowed out a little more after each successive printing.

Guy Cosnard's artistic universe is inhabited by ports, people and animals of the seaside. His works are the graphic translation of his emotions, and above all of his passion for the coastline and his adopted town: Loctudy. The two engravings that he offered to the association of the friends of the cannery and which are now exhibited in the museum represent the maritime and industrial universe of Loctudy of which the cannery is the main symbol.

The artist reproduces his works in small series of about ten prints. In 2015, he won the public prize at the Manoir de Kérazan, and in 2017, the jury prize at the Cap Caval exhibition in Penmarc'h.

To discover the other engravings of the artist, go to his website in click here.

In the hall of the former seaside villa of the Le Gall family, a work by the artist Nicole Girard. Born in Paris to a Bigoudène mother and a military father, she spent her childhood between Algeria and Nîmes where she took painting classes at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts from the age of 9 to 16. This early training and the family environment in which she grew up predestined her for a life as an artist. She has an imperious and irrepressible need to express herself through drawing and painting.

Her main source of inspiration is the Woman, in all her facets: young mothers, workers, bathers, dancers... etc. She works on these muses from studies, sketches, observation of models in everyday life in her native Brittany, where she returned after her marriage to a man from Lescollines, but also during trips such as to Morocco.

Her favourite material is acrylic, a material that offers a certain flexibility of movement. This flexibility can be seen in the setting of each scene, which she wants to be timeless, where the gesture aims to retranscribe a feeling, a state of mind. Here the painting represents the workers of fish canning factories in the Bigouden region. In this work we can feel the artist's admiration for these robust Bigouden women, who endure with pride all the hardships of their profession.

To find out more about the artist's work, visit his website.