Praxiteles
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The Franciscan Church Limerick
This is a picture of the church interior giving an idea of the object of recent demolition:
On the Franciscan Church in Limerick:
http://docs.limerickcity.ie/idocsweb/ViewFiles.aspx?docid=50718&format=djvu
@apelles wrote:
Ok Yep. .Point taken. . But all of the names you’ve quoted were well established here by 1900 when Buccini was brought here to do this. Was it Drogheda were you mentioned before that a company from Belgian was brought over to decorate a church?
Yes, they were finishing the apse wall in St. Peter’s when the war broke out in 1914.
Then, take Brendan grimes book on Byrne and you will have a glimpse of he regularity with which statuary was imppored from Italy – often from very accomplished masters.
@apelles wrote:
I think what they mean by “typical” is that it was more commonplace back then to have such paintings adorning the sanctuary walls. . And I agree that it is both spectacular and splendidly positioned. .Their very lucky in Kilcullen to have this piece still intact after 110 years.
What I wasn’t so aware of is how “They brought over Italian craftsmen to decorate the churches because the Irish traditions and skills had all disappeared over 600 years of occupation” Which seems strange when you think of the amount of Irish artists whose names keep cropping up on this thread who were well known decorators from this period. . Namely Hodkinsons of Limerick, Earlys, The Craftworkers & the other chap who done Maynooth whose name I can’t remember.– Hodkinson’s set up originally in Cork having came from England.
– Earlys came from England to open up shop in Dublin with Powells from Birmingham
– Pearse came from England to set up in Dublin.
– Pain Bros from England
– Pietro Turnerelli born in Belfast of Italian father.
– A. W. N. Pugin enough said– JJ McCarthy was Milesian!
To Praxiteles’ eye there is nothing “typical” about this picture. It is quite spectacular and splendidly positioned.
More news from the Pugin Foundation in Tasmania:
8 August 2010. Environs reinstatement at Colebrook.
Further reinstatement of the historic environs of St Patrick’s, Colebrook, has been accomplished with the planting of an additional nine trees within the churchyard. These trees are of the same type and in the same locations as those visible in early 1890s photographs of the church. They include poplars, pencil pines, a cork oak, an English elm and a cedar of Lebanon. All trees have been donated by our Friends of Pugin. The plantings will not reinstate the entire 1890s tree complement because of the need to preserve views of the church from Colebrook village. A pear and two apple trees were already planted in their original locations two years ago.
22 August 2010. Colebrook conservation works re-started.
A start has been made on the next phase of the conservation works at St Patrick’s, Colebrook. The carpet in the nave and aisles is being removed and the original wooden floor carefully remediated. This includes the painstaking removal of glue which had been used to stick the carpet down in the 1970s. After cleaning, the floor will be waxed and carpet runners installed between the west door and the rood screen, and between the north porch door and the central aisle. The chancel floor was similarly remediated several years ago.
New from the Pugin Foundation in Australia:
22 September 2009. Pugin Stained Glass Discovery.
In mid September 2009 work was being done on the church hall adjacent to St Mark’s, Darling Point, in the eastern suburbs of Sydney, under heritage architect Paul Davies. In a ceiling cavity above the toilets what appears to be the original Pugin three-light chancel east window was discovered. Because the space was boarded in there was no knowledge of the existence of the glass, which must have been removed from the church in the 1880s when a replacement window was installed.
The window was covered in over 120 years of dust and some sections appear to be missing. Other parts are broken. However, the original cartoons exist in the Birmingham Museums and Art Gallery, so anything is possible. It has been transported to the studio of Mass Vale stained glass conservator Rick Allan. Apparently a miraculous survival, being one of just three Pugin-designed windows in Australia.
Pugin’s design for the glass (Courtesy Birmingham Museums and Art Gallery)
8 October 2009. Darling Point Glass.
It has now been confirmed that the glass discovered last month (see entry below) is in fact Pugin’s window. Some panels have been cleaned revealing richly-coloured work in the English thirteenth-century idiom.
Church of the Immaculate Conception, Kanturk, Co. Cork
There also remains here the unsettled question of the removal of the gates from the altar rail. These are all by McGlouglin’s of Dublin and mysteriously disappeared from the rail during the recent “renovations”. The Conservation Officer claims, at least to some people, that their removal was not authorised.
As for a a declaration of the works mentioned above, a search of Cork County Council planning website fails to provide the usual information concerning such declarations.
It is indeed useful that Apelles has re-opened this case.
Church of the Immaculate Conception, Kanturk, Co. Cork
“The church has quite an extensive volume of Stained Glass Windows, all of which were completely refurbished prior to the implementation of the requirements of Planning Act 2000”.
Are we absolutely sure of this? Especially with regard to the west window.
A reflection for the “restorers” of Cobh Cathedral:
Olim lacus colueram
.
Olim lacus colueram,
olim pulcher exstiteram,
dum cygnus ego fueram.Refl.
Miser, miser!
Modo niger
et ustus fortiter!2.
Eram nive candidior,
quavis ave formosior;
modo sum corvo nigrior.Refl.
Miser, miser!
Modo niger
et ustus fortiter!3.
Me rogus urit fortiter,
gyrat, regyrat garcifer;
propinat me nunc dapifer.Refl.
Miser, miser!
Modo niger
et ustus fortiter!4.
Mallem in aquis vivere,
nudo semper sub aere,
quam in hoc mergi pipere.Refl.
Miser, miser!
Modo niger
et ustus fortiter!5.
Nunc in scutella iaceo
et volitare nequeo;
dentes Prendente video –Refl.
Miser, miser!
Modo niger
et ustus fortiter!Drogheda church to get medieval font back
A medieval baptismal font that was removed from a church in Drogheda when it was demolished and ended up as a museum exhibit, is to return to use in one of the town’s churches.
Fr Denis Nulty, who is parish priest of St Mary’s parish, welcomed the offer of the font that will now be re-located at the altar of his church and revert to its original function.After St John’s Medieval Church was knocked down, the ornate font was moved temporarily to St Mary’s Church but was bought subsequently by a member of the Old Drogheda Society.
The new owner, Ms Moira Corcoran, who purchased the artefact in the 1980s, ultimately decided to donate it to the Millmount Museum after it was established.
The museum regarded the acquisition as one of its best exhibits and displayed it prominently in the reception area but now has agreed to return the historic font to St Mary’s.
The font is made from sandstone and marble and has eight carved panels depicting Christ’s crucifixion and resurrection and the seven sacraments.
A 600-year-old Catholic Church was found in a small village of Sangyu, located along the ancient roads of western Beijing.
This church, which could be dated back to the Yuan Dynasty (1206-1368), brings a foreign flavor to the ancient village.
An ancient courtyard full of moss, mottled walls and caved beams provide visitors a journey through time.
The Catholic faith was spread to China during the Yuan Dynasty with the incursion of the Inner Mongolian Army. During that time, western Catholic missionaries were famous for medical service.
They preached the gospel to Sangyu and built the church in 1334 named “Sacred Heart of Jesus Church,” belonging to the Beijing parish. Believers had then grown to more than 100.
In 1534, the Thirteenth Year of Jiangjing of the Qing Dynasty (1636-1912), the church had its first reconstruction, growing to 5 rooms.
The plaque above the gate booking “All have a true source” was also added during that time.
After several reconstructions, the church was rebuilt into a two-storey building from a small building with 2 rooms during the Yuan Dynasty. The church is known as the largest and oldest Catholic Church in the Beijing suburb so far.
The last renovations were completed in 1988. Despite several reconstructions, the church has maintained its original gothic style and its exterior view gives visitors a holy feeling. On every Lord’s Day, the church is filled with believers from the village.
Old and even worn-put hymn books and Holy Bibles tell the miraclethe succes about sion of the Catholic faith in this very small village.
This, Praxiteles suspects, post dates the 1985 gutting and probably reflects the awful mess splashed on the west wall of St Mary’s Oratory in nearby Maynooth College – some, I suppose, would regard this as an example of “cross cultural pollination”.
Apelles!
Praxiteles saw this church before the gutting took place in 1985 and recalls a marvellous brass funereal monmument on the Gospel side which, if memory serves correctly, was erected to the memory of Bishop Brownrigg. Has that managed to survive?
As for responsibility for the gutting, one of the prinicple movers in Naas was a certainFr Larry Ryan who, around that time, became Coadjutor to the then Bishop of Kildare and Leighlin succeeding him not long afterwards. This was the same person who very unhappily involved himself in the case of a proposed gutting of the church in Edenderry.
Apelles!
Concerning your posting on St Mary’s and St. David’s in Naas you write:
“Most recent renovations, carried out in 1985, incorporated the directives of the 2nd Vatican Council, by removing the high altar, side altars, altar rails, Pulpit, and beautiful Mosaic Floor”.
Please note that there are NO such directives anywhere in Sacrosanctum Concilium nor in the subsequent executive decrees nor in Institutio Generalis.
That myth was addressed in teh case of Carlow cathedral when a letter was produced in the High Court affirming that no such directives exist and it was written by one Joseph Ratzinger.
It was also addressed extensively in the Cobh Cathedral case and shown beyond a shadow of a doubt that these “reorderings” are nothing more than the fantasies of clapped out soixanthuitard “liturgists”.
@apelles wrote:
This crowd in Derry think they’ve found an answer to the storm glazing issue. . http://www.artglassireland.com/storm_glazing.html alas though, it still detracts from the way the stained glass was designed to look.
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“The Unique Art Glass storm glazing system solves the triple problems of water penetration; trapped condensation and heat gain. The glazing is waterproof and allows the building to breathe. In the field of stained glass conservation this glazing system is unique.”Just awful and it probably costs a fortune.
I am not too sure that this practice has been completely outed and dicredited yet – or at least some of the conservation officers in the LAAs either have not read the guidelines offered by the National Heritage Council or else could not care less.
Praxiteles is aware of a case in Cork Couny where the conerrvation officer (M. Hallinan) had no difficulty at all in permitting the erection of something in the region of 650 square feet of this beautiful georgian wire galss in front of a large neo-Gothic church window. Moerover, the conservation officer was so eager to allow this, that it was deemed that planning permission was NOT necessary for such a major alteration to a protected structure.
As it turned out, a rather particular legal mechjanism had to be applied to bring this issue into the public forum. When so applied, the ever eager Cork County Couincil was good enough to make a declaration to the effect that erecting 650 square feet of storm glazing did not amount to an alteration to the characted of a protected structure and was thus considered EXEMPT development.
Well, a trip to ABP put a stop to the County Councils trot pretty quickly when it determined that not only would the application of 650 square feet of storm glazing alter the character of an element of a protected structure but would also alter the character of the entire structure itself.
Mind you, Praxiteles is not sure of the significance of an architectural protected area is since the church is right bang in the middle of one such area and the same conservation officer appeard to have made no effort whatsoever to save the few remaining 19th century sash windows in the terraces at either side of the church and in the terraces in front of it.
Can we please have another section on conservation officers put into the Building Act?
To answer your question about whether rubbish was applied to the stained glass in Cobh, I notice that the storm glazing overseen by Mr. Slattery is “6mm Georgian wire glass”.
The description below mentions “Wired glass is a rolled Annealed Glass containing 12.5mm steel mesh”.
Do you think the discrepancy of figures is likely to have much of a prcatical imort?
Just to have an idea of georgian wired glass:
The more traditional types of safety glass are the Georgian wired glass. Available in polished wire or cast wire they are used frequently in balcony panels, hallway doors even as decorative glass for table tops and cabinet doors when an industrial look is required. The cast wire glass is obscured so it also can provide privacy as well as safety where is needed.
