Giacomo Manzù: St Thérèse of Lisieux
Title: St Thérèse of Lisieux
Artist: Giacomo Manzù (1908–1991, Italian)
Location: Westminster Cathedral (RC)
Date: 1952
When, in December 1943, Bernard Griffin succeeded Cardinal Arthur Hinsley as Archbishop of Westminster, he was determined that there should be in the Cathedral a statue or mosaic of St Thérèse of Lisieux (1873–1897), whom he regarded as ‘the greatest saint of modern times.’
A mosaic was completed by John Trinick in March 1950. The work, however, was highly criticised. Following the Cardinal’s death in 1956, the Italian sculptor, Giacomo Manzù, was invited to submit a design.
‘In response to the invitation by the Westminster Cathedral Art and Architecture Committee to Giacomo Manzù that he should produce a low relief bronze wall panel showing St Thérèse of Lisieux for the Cathedral, Manzù submitted a sketch in 1956. This was immediately approved and the commission awarded. Manzù then proceeded to design and produce the bronze in Italy with casting taking place in Milan. The cost was £680, which was defrayed by Miss Janet Howard as a memorial to her sister, Alice Lawrason Howard.’ (Source: Westminster Cathedral Magazine, Oremus, November 2015)
Born in Bergamo, the son of an impoverished shoemaker, the sculptor Giacomo Manzù (1908–1991, Italian) was apprenticed to a wood carver at a young age. Fiercely independent, and almost entirely self-taught, he refused to align himself with any particular movement saying, ‘For me there is just work … aesthetic and intellectual theories do not concern me.’ He completed numerous secular and religious commissions including two reliefs for the Palazzo d’Italia in Rockefeller Center and a large bronze of a woman holding a baby outside the United Nations headquarters. He is most noted for the bronze ‘door of death’ he made for St Peter’s Basilica in Rome in 1964. Vatican officials were wary of Manzù’s communist politics and criticised his refusal to temper his unflinching depiction of death and human suffering with a more spiritual theme. Particularly shocking was his depiction of a cardinal looking at a man being crucified upside-down, a reference to the execution of fascists after WWII. In 1969 a permanent gallery of his work was built in Ardea with money donated by prominent patrons from fourteen countries.
Further Information
Medium: Bronze
Permanent display
See Giacomo Manzù’s ‘St Theresa of Lisieux’ on the Ecclesiart map here.
Other artworks in churches by Giacomo Manzù: Door of Death, 1964–7, St Peter’s Basilica, Rome.
Other artworks in Westminster Cathedral: Bartlett Mosaics (Leonard McComb), Gerontius panels (Tom Phillips), Blessed Sacrament Chapel mosaics (Boris Anrep), Stations of the Cross (Eric Gill). See art, marbles and mosaics at Westminster Cathedral here.