Gabriel Loire was a French

French people

The French are a nation that share a common French culture and speak the French language as a mother tongue. Historically, the French population are descended from peoples of Celtic, Latin and Germanic origin, and are today a mixture of several ethnic groups...

 stained glass

Stained glass

The term stained glass can refer to coloured glass as a material or to works produced from it. Throughout its thousand-year history, the term has been applied almost exclusively to the windows of churches and other significant buildings...

 artist of the twentieth century whose extensive works, portraying various persons or historical scenes, appear in many venues around the world. He founded the Loire Studio in Chartres, France which continues to produce stained glass windows. Loire was a leader in the modern use of "slab glass" (French: dalle de verre), which is much thicker and stronger than the stained glass technique of the Middle Ages

Middle Ages

The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...

. The figures in his windows are mostly Impressionistic

Impressionism

Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement that originated with a group of Paris-based artists whose independent exhibitions brought them to prominence during the 1870s and 1880s...

 in style.

His life

Loire was born in Pouancé

Pouancé

Pouancé is a commune in the Maine-et-Loire department in western France. It is located on the border of 4 French departements: the Maine-et-Loire where its belong, the Mayenne in the North, the Ille-et-Vilaine in the North-west, and the Loire-Atlantique in the West.Since the Middle-age, Pouancé is...

, France, on April 21, 1904. After completing his schooling in Angers

Angers

Angers is the main city in the Maine-et-Loire department in western France about south-west of Paris. Angers is located in the French region known by its pre-revolutionary, provincial name, Anjou, and its inhabitants are called Angevins....

 in 1926, he went to a stained glass workshop in Chartres

Chartres

Chartres is a commune and capital of the Eure-et-Loir department in northern France. It is located southwest of Paris.-Geography:Chartres is built on the left bank of the Eure River, on a hill crowned by its famous cathedral, the spires of which are a landmark in the surrounding country...

, France. In 1946, he founded his own stained glass studio there, which continues under the direction of his son Jacques Loire and grandsons.

He died on Christmas Day, December 25, 1996, shortly after finishing a design for a new window.

His works in stained glass

Loire often expressed the view, "La paix donne la joie" ("Peace gives joy") and particularly liked working with shades of blue, which he said represented to him the color of peace. His stained glass artistry, blending modern and traditional elements, attained wide acceptance, as indicated by the considerable output of the Loire Studio displayed around the world. In addition to more than 450 installations in France, Loire's works are found in Great Britain, Germany, Ireland, South Africa, Japan, Chile

Chile

Chile ,officially the Republic of Chile , is a country in South America occupying a long, narrow coastal strip between the Andes mountains to the east and the Pacific Ocean to the west. It borders Peru to the north, Bolivia to the northeast, Argentina to the east, and the Drake Passage in the far...

, Canada, Australia and the United States of America.

Some of his important commissions were for churches rebuilt after destruction in World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

, in particular the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church

Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church

The Protestant Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church is located in Berlin on the Kurfürstendamm in the centre of the Breitscheidplatz. The original church on the site was built in the 1890s. It was badly damaged in a bombing raid in 1943...

 (Kaiser Wilhelm Gedachtniskirche) in Berlin, Germany (1960) and the Church of St. Walberge, Xertigny, Lorraine

Lorraine (région)

Lorraine is one of the 27 régions of France. The administrative region has two cities of equal importance, Metz and Nancy. Metz is considered to be the official capital since that is where the regional parliament is situated...

, France (1951–1952). His greatest post-war work is in the Church of Saint Paul, Whiteinch, Glasgow (1960).It consists of 162 Square metres of curved window set in cement and embedded with chipped glass.The main panels depict the life of Saint Paul and are ably supported in the side alter by panels of the Virgin and the roof of the Baptismal font. He has other works in the Church of Our Lady of Perpetual Succor, Broomhill (1965). Though the technique here is not of chipped glas but more of painted glass. The significance of these works has been noted by the Scottish Government by listing the buildings with, "B" orders.

His celebrated Christ in Triumph over Darkness and Evil was dedicated in 1982 at St. George's Cathedral

St. George's Cathedral, Cape Town

St George's Cathedral is the Anglican cathedral in Cape Town, South Africa. It is the seat of the Archbishop of Cape Town....

 in Cape Town

Cape Town

Cape Town is the second-most populous city in South Africa, and the provincial capital and primate city of the Western Cape. As the seat of the National Parliament, it is also the legislative capital of the country. It forms part of the City of Cape Town metropolitan municipality...

, South Africa, in memory of British war hero Earl Mountbatten of Burma

Louis Mountbatten, 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma

Admiral of the Fleet Louis Francis Albert Victor Nicholas George Mountbatten, 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma, KG, GCB, OM, GCSI, GCIE, GCVO, DSO, PC, FRS , was a British statesman and naval officer, and an uncle of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh...

, the last Viceroy

Viceroy

A viceroy is a royal official who runs a country, colony, or province in the name of and as representative of the monarch. The term derives from the Latin prefix vice-, meaning "in the place of" and the French word roi, meaning king. A viceroy's province or larger territory is called a viceroyalty...

 of India.

For St. Andrew's-Wesley Church in Vancouver, Canada, Loire created three different commissions: in 1969, a set of six windows dedicated to women in the Bible; also in 1969, “The Great Commission”, based on Mark 16:15 “Go ye into the all the world”; and in 1981, a set of eight windows based on Romans 9:4–5.

Other notable works include Loire's stained glass windows designed in 1962 for Whatley Chapel at Johnson & Wales University in Denver, CO, and in 1980 for Salisbury Cathedral

Salisbury Cathedral

Salisbury Cathedral, formally known as the Cathedral Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary, is an Anglican cathedral in Salisbury, England, considered one of the leading examples of Early English architecture....

 in England, as well as in 1967 for Grace Cathedral, San Francisco.

Two large and striking windows were completed for St Augustine's Chapel in Cork, Ireland in about 1972. These windows measure 12.5 metres in height and about 2 metres wide; the glass is solid coloured, not stained, glass. This glass is approximately 26 millimetres thick and is described as valle-de-verre, flagstones of glass, set in concrete and forming an integral load-bearing part of the building. Please see thumbnails.

External links

• Loire Studio (official website)
• Grace Cathedral, San Francisco, California (RealVideo tour)