Before:
After (either a spectacular window or art looking like a window was covered! WHY????
After, after: (Mine eyes are drawn to the overpowering color of the columns which is a screaming color demanding my eyes look at them, a kind of color narcissism, no? Who thought this distracting color was a good idea?:
CATHEDRAL IN NORWICH
13 comments:
The Baldachino is a bit weird and it looks like they went crazy with the colored markers, but considering the other possibilities, it could have been a lot worse.
Neo-gothic buildings should have polychrome interiors since this was how they looked in the Middle Ages. We are so used to seeing unadorned grey stone that we imagine it to be normative. But to the medieval mind the more garish the colour scheme, the better, and it applied also to the building's exterior.
Needless rebuilding feeding the egos of those running the capital campaigns. Given their track record, I wonder what the sanctuary of the 2030s will look like. That aside, it is actually very nice though retaining the high altar, respecting it as part of the original design and using it would have been nicer. I'm so tired of tabernacles on these micro altars and pedestals. Again, why would you have such a beautiful window and then park a baldacchino in front of it? Agree, the color of the columns doesn't work well (nor do they seem to thematically tie in with anything), it adds to the business of the palatte and it creates a forest effect when viewed from the back of the nave.
Norwich England or Norwich Connecticut?
Uh, it can't be Norwich, Connecticut, as it is not a see city---instead, is a part of the Diocese of Bridgeport. Not anymore than the "bishop of Madison" could be referring to Madison, Georgia. Speaking of Madison---how long before the Left wants his name removed? After all, he was from antebellum Virginia....
Saint Patrick's Church in Norwich, Conn. I think the website I got the pictures said it was a cathedral. Certainly could be used as one.
I like the color of the columns, my guess being they don’t look the same at pew level as they do in the balcony level photograph. I also think the baldacchino is an improvement. It is an attempt to give that little altar the prominence of the grand traditional altar without actually re-installing the traditional altar. Yes, putting back the traditional altar would have been the ideal solution.
Norwich is a diocese on Connecticut.
According to the Liturgical Arts Journal, the color scheme is the original. Victorian Gothic churches were often very colorful and patterned.
I was surprised to learn the stained glass windows are not real. They used glazes and gilding to paint faux windows.
Norwich (England) boasts the second-largest Catholic cathedral in the British Isles, built in the Early English Gothic style between 1884 and 1910. The medieval cathedral is now of course in Anglican hands.
The current bishop, Alan Hopes, was one of Pope Francis's first appointments. A former Anglican priest, he left the CofE in 1994 when they voted to ordain women. Not long after his installation as Bishop of East Anglia he celebrated a Pontifical High Mass (EF) at the throne, the first English bishop to do so in his own cathedral since the 1960s.
In recent years a new emphasis has been placed on restoring the musical traditions 'unduly neglected following the Second Vatican Council' with a special place for Gregorian Chant 'in the Solemn Liturgy and the recitation of the Divine Office.' To this end the cathedral choir has been augmented by a professional Schola Cantorum and a group of young choristers drawn from local schools.
As Fr Kavanaugh reminded us on 1 September, change comes quickly here and slowly there!
I wonder if, in the original colorful days, the lighting inside the buildings was much dimmer, and the vivid colors were used to overcome the lack of illumination?
I'm not a fan of the deep cranberry columns. They dominate everything.
Sorry, I was confusing Norwalk and Norwich (216pm). You know, like confusing Columbus and Columbia, or Phenix City (Alabama) and the other Phoenix a bit further west!
By the way, Norwich rhymes with porridge. Is Norwich CT pronounced ths way?
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