reorganisation and destruction of irish catholic churches

The Oxford Oratory otherwise the former Jesuit church of St. Aloysius is currently undergoing major restoration work the object of which is to recover the original paint scheme of the ceiling and walls.

It appears that in the 1950s, the Jesuites painted everything out in white, cream and brown. Thta also included the whitewashing of the marble revetment of the sanctuary.

At present, everything of the white, cream and brown is being striped off to reveal the splendour of the original stencil work. We shall keep an eye on this development. Perhaps James1852 might know something of it?

The Jesuit treatment of this church is just about as brutal as their vandalism at the Holy Name in Manchester – which also, mercifully, has passed into the hands of the Oratorians.

Here we have a further photograph of the sanctuary of the Oxford Oratory. The retablos of Saints behind the High Altar is evocative of a similar arrangement behind the High Altar in North Cathedral in Cork (statues by Hogan) which was willfully dismantkled and dumped by Boyd Barrett in a tremendous fit of lunacy. In common with Professor O’Neill, this firm too had the opportunity of destroying another Turnerelli masterpiece – this time, the funeral monument for Bishop Francis Moylan who died in 1815.

Just imagine, all the polychrome saints were painted cream in 1954!!

The beginnings of the lunacy which includes painting out decorated interiors can be traced to Germany before the First World War. These were accellerated in the German inter-war years and came to full “fruition” in the chaos of Germany following the Second World War. The figure of Rudolf Scharez looms over all this this – even to the point of trying to create a new or re-defined sacred iconography which, of course, led to nothing other than a private language muttered to himself or shared with a few intimate “initiates”.

The lunacy arrived in Ireland with the famous church architecture exhibition of 1962. Our friend Austin Flannery was not unconnected with the organising of that exhibition and its first fruits were to be seen in what happened in St. Saviour’s in Domnick Street, Dublin. Then the raft of indigenous exponents of the German luncay began: McCormack, Hurley, Heddermann and a whole host of lesser copiests.

As with borrowed iead that come to Ireland, the German luncay movement fossailzed and, indeed, atrified into the most absolutist and fascist dogmatism which remains utterly imperbvious to any theological, liturgical, or architectural development to have have happened in the last 50 years. Let us be clòear abut it: the German lunacy temporally antecedes teh Second Vatican Council and untimately has nothing to do with the Second Vatican Council – either by way of influence or by way of implementation. The German lunacy did however selectively use the liturgical reforms of the Second Vatican Council to promote itself and to claim for itself an ecclesiastical approval as representative of the Second Vatican Council it simply does not have and never had.

The points that Praxiteles makes here are well illustrated by the kind of fauve pioucessness retailed by Richard Hurley at the recent Ballincollig Conference organised by Cork County Council while Kevin Seasiolz, at the same Conference, claptrapped the rather descrited liturgical histiography of Jungmann that is usually trotted out to lend a fig-leaf od academic respectability to what is patently fictitious.

Johnglas: Praxiteles was actually referring to the Sanctuary arrangement in the Noth Cathedral as it existed between 1827 and 1963/4. The original High Altar -also by Hogan- was replaced at some stage in the late 19th. or early 20th century with a marble altar which is now against one of the side walls – we have a HIgh Court action taken by one of the faithful at the time of the 1997 gutting to thank for that. Hurley’s original plan was to discard it totally.

The present sanctuary in Cork was inatalled in 1962/63 when the back wall of the 1827 Sanctuary was demolished – which explains the differemnce in ceiling levels between the present sanctuary and the nave. The 1828 Sanctuary did not have a window behind the High Altar. Rather, in a somewhat Spanish style- it had a Retablos which covered the entire back wall and was fitted with some 27 statues by Hogan. These disappeared when Boyd-Barrett hacked the place in 1962 but were “rediscovered” in the recent Hurley make over and have been placed on brackets around the Cathedral. We have a photograph of the 1827 arangement on this thread – in fact there are two photographs on the thread.

Johnglas: Here is the North Cathedral, Cork, showing the 1827 interior, by the Pain Brothers, with the retablos containing the statues by Hogan and the later High Altar.

The 1827 High Altar was in wood and executed by Hogan. A panel depicting the Last Supper from the antependium of that altar is in the Crawford Gallery.

@Praxiteles wrote:

Just what is going on here?

Re the deterioration on the ribbing behind the altar: could this possible derive from having painted the ribs a nice glossy white?

Does not appear to be painted.. my theory is that some investigation has taken place into the state of the mosaics around the east window, with some carelessness resulting in the loss of detailing on the reredos (just noticed that one of the crockets has also been damaged since 2007).

The restoration in 2002/2003 was supposed to rectify all of these problems..

Erected by Pope Clement IX in 1669

The following are the Bernini statues on the Ponte Sant’Angelo. The numbers refer to the series of photographs in the preceeding post. The Latin inscriptions are taken from the Sixto-Clementine version of the Vulgate:

5. Angel with the lance by Domenico Guidi, with the inscription “Vulnerasti cor meum” (You have ravished my heart) – Song of Solomon 4:9.

10. Angel with the reed with sponge by Antonio Giorgetti, with the inscription “Potaverunt me aceto” (They gave me vinegar to drink) – Psalm 68:22.

9. Angel with the cross by Ercole Ferrata, with the inscription “Cuius principatus super humerum eius” (His principality he bore upon his shoulders) – Isaiah 9:6.

3. Angel with the intitulation on the cross (INRI) a copy by Bernini himself and his student Giulio Cartari with the inscription “Regnavit a ligno Deus” (God reigned from the wood [of the Cross]) The original, by Bernini and his son Paolo, was installed in Sant’Andrea delle Fratte. The inscription here is taken from the Vexilla Regis, written by Venantius Fortunatus (530-609) and considered one of the greatest hymns of the Latin liturgy. Fortunatus wrote it in honor of the arrival of a large relic of the True Cross which had been sent to Queen Radegunda by the Byzantine Emperor Justin II and his Empress Sophia. Queen Radegunda had retired to a convent she had built near Poitiers and was seeking out relics for the church there. To help celebrate the arrival of the relic in Poitiers, the Queen asked Fortunatus to write a hymn for the procession of the relic to the church.

1. Angel with the seamless garment and dice by Paolo Naldini, with the inscription “Super vestem meam miserunt sortem” (They cast lots for my clothes) – Psalm 21:19.

7. Angel with the nails by Girolamo Lucenti, with the inscription “Aspiciant ad me quem confixerunt” (They will behold me whom they crucified) – Zachariah 12:10.

6. Angel with the veil of Veronica by Cosimo Fancelli, with the inscription “Respice faciem Christi tui” (Behold the face of thy Anointed One” – Psalm 83:11.

2. Angel withthe crown of thorns a cpy of the original by Paolo Naldini with the inscription “In aerumna mea dum configitur spina” (In my affliction the [crown of] thorns is fixed upon me) – Psalm 31:4 . The original statue by Bernini and his son Paolo was never erected on the bridge. Instead it was installed in the church of Sant’Andrea delle Fratte.

8. Angel with the pillar by Antonio Raggi, with the inscription “Tronus meus in columna” (My throne is the pillar) – Wisdom 24:4.

4. Angel with the scourge by Lazzaro Morelli, with the inscription “In flagella paratus sum” (I was redied by scourging) – Psalm 37:18.

And a panorama:

http://www.italyguides.it/us/roma/bridge_of_castel_st_angelo.htm

Again on the Vexilla Regis, here is the Latin text and the Englich translation:

1. Vexilla regis prodeunt,
fulget crucis mysterium,
quo carne carnis conditor
suspensus est patibulo

2. Quae vulnerata lanceae Mucrone diro, criminum
Ut nos lavaret sordibus, Manavit und(a) et sanguine.

3. Impleta sunt quae concinit David fideli carmine,
Dicendo nationibus: Regnavit a ligno Deus.

4. Arbor decor(a) et fulgida, Ornata Regis purpura,
Electa digno stipite Tam sancta membra tangere.

5. Beata, cuius brachiis Pret(i)um pependit saeculi:
Statera facta corporis, Tulitque praedam tartari.

6. O CRUX AVE, SPES UNICA, Hoc Passionis tempore
Piis adauge gratiam, Reisque dele crimina.

7. Te, fons salutis Trinitas, Collaudet omnis spiritus:
Quibus Crucis victoriam Largiris, adde praemium. Amen.

English translation

1. The standards of the King are raised,
the mystery of the Cross shines,
on which the creator of flesh was hung
in the flesh upon the gibbet.”

2. Who, wounded with a direful spear,
Did, purposely to wash us clear
From stain of sin, pour out a flood
Of precious Water mixed with Blood.

3. That which the Prophet-King of old
Hath in mysterious verse foretold,
Is now accomplished, whilst we see
God ruling nations from a Tree.

4. O lovely and reflugent Tree,
Adorned with purpled majesty;
Culled from a worthy stock, to bear
Those Limbs which sanctified were.

5. Blest Tree, whose happy branches bore
The wealth that did the world restore;
The beam that did that Body weigh
Which raised up hell’s expected prey.

6. Hail, Cross, of hopes the most sublime!
Now in this mournful Passion time,
Improve religious souls in grace,
The sins of criminals efface.

7. Blest Trinity, salvation’s spring,
May every soul Thy praises sing;
To those Thou grantest conquest by
The holy Cross, rewards apply. Amen.

I’ve often wondered why more of our church’s aren’t decorated with Celtic revival art…

BY EMMA CULLINAN THE IRISH TIMES Thursday, October 16, 2008

SOME SAY that shopping has become the new religion and in certain parts of Ireland intensive development has brought retail and religious life face-to-face

That happened in Dún Laoghaire when the Bloomfield shopping centre was being built in the early 1990s on the grounds of a Dominican convent. While most of the order’s buildings were being demolished, a group of people (the likes of whom the world must be ever grateful for) fought for the preservation of a tiny Oratory whose simple exterior hid a large and stunning example of Celtic revival art: a testimony to human spirit, drive and creativity.

The Oratory was built in 1919 at the end of the first World War in thanksgiving for peace and also as a war memorial. It was constructed by Louis Monks, who was responsible for a number of buildings in Dun Laoghaire, and he perhaps even designed this one.

The ‘decoration’ in the simple building was limited to a statue of the Sacred Heart, which was brought over from France, taking centre place amid the pale plaster walls and (then) concrete floor. But now this gold icon has become just one element in an elaborate, multi-coloured, melodic medley of interlacing patterns and multiple symbols, including grinning snakes, and birds whose necks and beaks curl to create Celtic rings.

This gem is enclosed by two buildings and so is akin to the prize found after unwrapping a pass-the-parcel. The original Oratory building has been protected by a larger structure, funded by the EU and designed by the OPW. Surprisingly, but perhaps for good reason, this outer shell does not have vast expanses of glass through which lots of natural light could have entered the stained glass windows in the Oratory.

On entering the outer building you reach a lobby and turn to the right where you meet the white front of the Oratory – its side walls are hidden behind doors.

Open the doors into the chapel and the sight makes you involuntarily draw in breath – every wall is covered in colour and pattern. The room is small- at 5.85m by 3.60m – but as an art work it is huge. It rewards as a complete piece but offers further gains in close scrutiny of sections.

It took 16 years to paint and was the work of Sister Mary Concepta who learnt the art of such illustration from her father Thomas Lynch who ran a company that illuminated manuscripts.

Born Lily Lynch in 1874, the young girl would help in her father’s Grafton Street studio during holidays from her school in the Dominican Convent. Their time together was cut short because her father died in 1890, when Lily was just 16, yet she had learnt enough to take over the running of the studio. After six years disaster struck again when the workshop burned down, and Lily returned to the convent becoming Sister Mary Concepta. Here she continued her creative work, teaching art and playing music. When the Oratory was built 30 years later she asked if she could decorate it.

Celtic art had seen a revival, starting in the 18th century and accelerating in the late 19th century and early 20th century as Ireland was breaking away from British rule. In certain parts of the country architecture looked back too – to a time when styles were seen as more representative of Irish culture. The Honan chapel in Cork, for instance, was built in the Hiberno Romanesque style that drew on past designs for inspiration. The 1916 chapel’s façade is a copy of the 12th century Romanesque St Cronan church in Roscrea, Tipperary, and its interior is similar to that of Cormac’s Chapel, Cashel, Co Tipperary. It even has a miniature Irish round tower at one end.

Much of Honan’s interior fittings were hand-crafted, recalling a time when things weren’t machine made. This tied in with the Arts and Crafts movement of the early 20th century, which included the likes of William Morris, Dante Gabriel Rossetti and Charles Rennie Mackintosh, the latter also worked in the Art Nouveau style and some Celtic revivalist artists took influence from that art movement while others kept to a more traditional form.

Sister Mary Concepta worked in the latter style – staying true to works such as the eighth century Book of Kells – although the Oratory walls take in influences from Islamic art and also show a good deal of wit in some of the cartoon-like characters.

As with parts of the Honan Chapel, the stained glass windows in the Dún Laoghaire building are thought to be by Harry Clarke – or his studio. He probably catered closely to his client’s wishes as they are not in his distinctive style although the eyes are familiar – especially on the window to the right of the statue.

Every pattern on the Oratory walls and ceiling fits so well with the rest that Sister Concepta must have imagined the complete design before she began working – fitting in the task around her other full-time duties in days that began at 5.30am. The work was stencilled on: Sister Concepta would draw the designs on paper and sometimes old blinds and then cut them out.

This allowed her to use mirror images on opposite walls giving a sense of balance throughout. But there is also free-hand work, certainly in the dash and dot design at the top of the wall. Some of the dots were added in by the children as a reward for going to the paint shop for Sister Concepta, who couldn’t leave the convent herself.

She used normal household paint but gave very specific instructions as to how it should be mixed to achieve the shades she wanted and those colours are incredible in that they all work together: all the blues, browns, reds, greens, golds, mauves, blacks, whites, oranges and pale pinks combining, in intricate patterns to, paradoxically, create a feeling of calm.

Many of the designs were her own but a depiction of a monster biting a man has been identified as coming from the Book of Kells. Another influence was the Eucharistic Congress in Dublin in 1932, which saw dignitaries of the Catholic church descend on the city: this is recorded on opposite Oratory walls where Sister Concepta has reproduced the Eucharistic Cross, offering a clue as to when she painted this section.

The ceiling is calm, with simple designs and the outlines of interlacing that haven’t been coloured in. Sister Concepta had to stop working on the Oratory when she became ill in 1936 and yet the ‘unfinished’ work has a sense of completion, as if she decided to paint on the simple outlines to continue the overall pattern in the room and make it whole. She died of TB three years later, at the age of 65, but not without leaving this astonishing art work behind as well as linen panels describing her method of working – for her students – which are now in the National Gallery.

these beautiful photos are from http://www.theword.ie/cms/publish/article_671.shtml