reorganisation and destruction of irish catholic churches
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Joseph Connolly and the Guelph Basilica as planned by him:
And, as I am coming to another prototype, St Saviour’s, Dublin, I came across this most interesting link:
@Praxiteles wrote:
And, as I am coming to another prototype, St Saviour’s, Dublin, I came across this most interesting link:
interesting indeed.
depressing aswell. where do you suppose they put all that stuff? is it in some other church? an antique shop? or tucked away somewhere safely, awaiting resurrection? they hardly just dumped it all. so where is it?
Looking at the St. Saviour’s site is very interesting. They now afford the possibility of contrasting the church before and after the wreckage and devastation. Rumour has it that some of the breathren in St. Saviour’s are anxius to do something about restoring the interior -hence the information on the site. I think we can assure them taht public opinion is about 600% behind any effort to recover in any measure the original interior.
The devastator – Austin Flannery – is now certified gaga and so the possibility of doing something is beginning to emerge.
As for the interior: from what we hear, great quantities of it were simply dumped into a skip and ferried off. However, as for many of the fittings, one of the breathren has carefully hoarded them and is sitting….waiting….for retoration.
A quick aside;Here are two other large gothic city centre churches, both very fine. This first one is opposite the Mater beside that little park (what’s it called?)
[ATTACH]6717[/ATTACH][ATTACH]6718[/ATTACH]
And this is either a Dominican or Franciscan church, on the same street as St.Michan’s CoI, I think…must verify
It has magnificent decoration but has lost it’s stenciling in an outpouring of yellow idiocy.
[ATTACH]6719[/ATTACH][ATTACH]6720[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]6721[/ATTACH][ATTACH]6722[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]6723[/ATTACH]Is the first one not St. Joseph’s Berkley Road, by O’Neill and Byrne 1875-1880. Side altars by Ashlin and Colman. High ALtar by Mary Redmond. Is not the other St. Michan’s, Halston’s Street. Built 1811-14 with chancel, sacrist, side chapels, and tower by George Ashlin 1891-1902.
On second thoughts, is the second church with the painted stations of the cross St. Mary’s, Church Street, a Capuchin church built by JJ. McCarthy 1868-1881.
yes st.Joseph’s and the Capuchin church exactly. Two very fine well preserved churches. The painted stations of the cross in the Capuchin church are excellent, as is the painting in the sanctuary.
re St.Saviour’s; you say some of it was dumped?but surely someone would have pawned it off for salvage? It’s far from worthless after all! At the very least, I’m sure there are people who’d employ a gothic pinnacle or a set of altar rails as a garden feature..
@Praxiteles wrote:
Here we have another interesting architectural firm specializing in the beautification of the horrors built as churches from the 1970s on:
Be sure to have a look at the excellent work of this great contemporary architect:
http://www.stroik.com
http://www.sacredarchitecture.orgArchitects and Restorers: Gaze upon those noble architectural features – and let them be a lesson and a guiding star to you!
@Praxiteles wrote:
Looking at the St. Saviour’s site is very interesting. They now afford the possibility of contrasting the church before and after the wreckage and devastation. Rumour has it that some of the breathren in St. Saviour’s are anxius to do something about restoring the interior -hence the information on the site. I think we can assure them taht public opinion is about 600% behind any effort to recover in any measure the original interior.
The devastator – Austin Flannery – is now certified gaga and so the possibility of doing something is beginning to emerge.
As for the interior: from what we hear, great quantities of it were simply dumped into a skip and ferried off. However, as for many of the fittings, one of the breathren has carefully hoarded them and is sitting….waiting….for retoration.
Took them long enough to certify AF.
At least with the photographs one has the possibility of imitating the original masterpiece.
Let the restoration of St Saviour’s begin!!@ake wrote:
yes st.Joseph’s and the Capuchin church exactly. Two very fine well preserved churches. The painted stations of the cross in the Capuchin church are excellent, as is the painting in the sanctuary.
re St.Saviour’s; you say some of it was dumped?but surely someone would have pawned it off for salvage? It’s far from worthless after all! At the very least, I’m sure there are people who’d employ a gothic pinnacle or a set of altar rails as a garden feature..
ake, you have no idea how bone-headed some ideologues can be. During the first wave of destruction in the 1960s and 70s, some churches in French Canada were selling off the sacred vessels and furnishings by the pound! Certainly some enterprising layfolk did divert the truck on the way to the dump, but the really committed iconoclasts made sure it was pulverized before it left church property.
An Anglican clergyman back in the late 1970s purchased a 17th-century silver censer made in France but brought to Canada – for the price of $250.00.
Hope the good folk who preserved parts of St Saviour’s will return them once the restoration commences.
@ake wrote:
yes st.Joseph’s and the Capuchin church exactly. Two very fine well preserved churches. The painted stations of the cross in the Capuchin church are excellent, as is the painting in the sanctuary.
re St.Saviour’s; you say some of it was dumped?but surely someone would have pawned it off for salvage? It’s far from worthless after all! At the very least, I’m sure there are people who’d employ a gothic pinnacle or a set of altar rails as a garden feature..
What was not ferried off in the skip was reduced to dust and dumped into the foundation of the rpesent sanctuary. Given the iconoclasm of the 1970s, money or commercial value was of no interest whatsoever. This was a much deeper idoleogical thing.
@Praxiteles wrote:
On second thoughts, is the second church with the painted stations of the cross St. Mary’s, Church Street, a Capuchin church built by JJ. McCarthy 1868-1881.
Apparently, the scrolls beneath the station oft he cross are in Irish. AN very interesting detail. At rpesent the statons look very isolated. What must theyb not have looked loike when surrounded by the stencil work.
@Rhabanus wrote:
ake, you have no idea how bone-headed some ideologues can be. During the first wave of destruction in the 1960s and 70s, some churches in French Canada were selling off the sacred vessels and furnishings by the pound! Certainly some enterprising layfolk did divert the truck on the way to the dump, but the really committed iconoclasts made sure it was pulverized before it left church property.
An Anglican clergyman back in the late 1970s purchased a 17th-century silver censer made in France but brought to Canada – for the price of $250.00.
Hope the good folk who preserved parts of St Saviour’s will return them once the restoration commences.
Funnily enough, Eamonn Duffy has several accounts of the lay people of various parishes hiding churhc furnishings from destruction during the English Reformation. See his book The Stripping of the Altars.
@Rhabanus wrote:
ake, you have no idea how bone-headed some ideologues can be. During the first wave of destruction in the 1960s and 70s, some churches in French Canada were selling off the sacred vessels and furnishings by the pound! Certainly some enterprising layfolk did divert the truck on the way to the dump, but the really committed iconoclasts made sure it was pulverized before it left church property.
An Anglican clergyman back in the late 1970s purchased a 17th-century silver censer made in France but brought to Canada – for the price of $250.00.
Hope the good folk who preserved parts of St Saviour’s will return them once the restoration commences.
Talking of restorations,there is an antoque dealer in Killarney who, over the years, has salvaged much of the fittings from the gutting Eamonn Casey did to St. mary’s in his efforts to outdo A.W.N. Pugin -just like our frind O’Neill’s efforts for Cobh Cathedral. Last year, he offered them back at the price he had bought them for. I do not know what heppened. Did anyone ever hear anymore of it?
And in the sme vein, an interesting article from this month’s Apollo Magazine:
http://www.apollo-magazine.com/news-and-comment/architecture/463151/flogging-off-the-silver.thtml
From the students of the university of Vienna;
@Praxiteles wrote:
From the students of the university of Vienna;
A glorious restoration indeed! Who would have thought it possible?
God bless the students of the University of Vienna!Thanks for posting this link, Prax!
Did anyone note, however, that the Stations of the Cross were installed backwards?
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