Irish Times Notes
Church of Ireland Notes from 'The Irish Times'
Saturday 30 July 2011
Architectural Drawings Catalogue
One of the considerable responsibilities which the Church of Ireland has inherited from its former status as the established church is the care and custody of a large number of historic church buildings. Some are grand structures like the medieval cathedrals in Dublin, Kildare, Limerick and Killaloe while others are more modest edifices designed to meet the needs of parishes. Some are important parts of urban streetscapes while others sit starkly in the landscape on the edge of once thriving villages or in the demesnes of country houses. In recent decades the Church of Ireland has sought to rationalise its stock of church buildings and some have been closed for worship. Of these, some have been converted to other uses (libraries, offices, residences), some demolished and some have become ruinous.
However, whether or not these buildings are still used for worship, whether they are still in the custody of the Representative Church Body or not, whether they are functioning in some capacity or other, or not, the interest in them never seems to flag. Architects, historians, students, genealogists and local voluntary groups regularly seek information about church buildings and increasingly their first place of resort in the Representative Church Body Library which is the archives of the Church of Ireland. This is so because the Library holds the records from over 1,000 parishes but also because it also holds a number of collections of architectural drawings of churches which include the work of some of the more important architects of the 19th century – William Atkins, Frederick Darley, John Semple, James Pain, Welland & Gillespie.
The increasing demand for access to these drawings has prompted the Library to conduct a pilot project, funded by the Esme Mitchell Trust, to make a digital catalogue of them. The architectural historian, Dr Michael O’Neill, has designed an interim Excel spreadsheet to describe the drawings and has photographed and catalogued 438 drawings of 40 churches in the dioceses of Ardfert, Armagh, Cashel, Clogher, Cloyne and Cork.
The photographs will provide digital surrogates for the drawings thus reducing the need to consult the originals, some of which are in a fragile condition, while the catalogue entries will provide key information on subjects, locations, architects, dates, media and dimensions.
It is hoped that this successful project will be a starting point for a major project to catalogue the entire collection of architectural drawings of churches in the RCB Library, estimated at some 7,500 items and to make this catalogue generally available through the Library website. Funding is being sought for this project.
Tomorrow (Sunday) the services in St Patrick’s Cathedral, Dublin, will be sung by the choir of St Mary’s Church, Moseley, while in Christ Church Cathedral the visiting choir will be from the parish of St Polycarp, Finaghy, directed by Simon Neill.
On Tuesday evening the Chamber Philarmonia from Cologne will give a concert in St Patrick’s Cathedral, Armagh, and on Wednesday evening the Friends of St Macartan’s Cathedral, in association with the William Carleton Summer School, will host a concert in Clogher Cathedral featuring the Armagh City Choir with the harpist, Margaret Skeffington, and Mary McKay.
The St Barrahane’s Church Music Festival in Castletownshend, Co. Cork, continues on Thursday evening with a recital by the pianist, Rebecca Capova, while in St Mary’s Cathedral, Limerick, on Friday there will be a lunchtime organ recital by Daniel Battle from All Saints Church, Carshalton, Surrey, who will play works by Hayden, Sweelinck, Mathias and others.