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Elias Abou Chabké (1903-1948), the well-known contemporary Lebanese poet, was born in Zouk Mikaël, where he lived all his life, and marked the town with his presence and its works.
The house where he lived in Zouk Mikaël is a typical Lebanese house, with old stones, a pitched roof, covered with red tiles. It represents a very beautiful paragon of Lebanese rustic architecture. Upon the death of Abou Chabké, the house was a legacy of his heirs who barely used it. Uninhabited and deserted, the house started little by little to fall in ruins.
Eager to safeguard the cultural and architectural inheritance of Zouk Mikaël, the municipality bought the house of the poet and restored it order to transform it in museum of contemporary art, the Museum of Abou Chabké, which would shelter also manuscripts and personal stuffs of the poet.
The restoration has safeguarded some delicate parts of the house such as some sections of the wall on which Abou Chabké had written drafts of some of his poems. The museum was designed to be able to accommodate exhibits and paintings, photographs and artistic installations. The house in itself represents a kind of architectural museum that belongs to the cultural history of Zouk Mikaël, and is spacious enough to accommodate certain types of cultural events.
Abou Chabké Musuem was inaugurated for the first timein January 1996 in the presence of the Minister for the Culture and high Lebanese officials.
It is surrounded today by a beautiful garden and well looked-after. The roundabout facing the house shelters, among its trees, a statue of the poet offered by the municipality. In June 2008, after some decoration works, the museum was improved and inaugurated another time in a ceremony that was a tribute to the poet and to his poetry. |
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