Parish church Bärnbach

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The Hundertwasser Church (2012)

The Roman Catholic parish church Bärnbach , commonly known as Hundertwasserkirche , is located in the municipality Bärnbach in the Voitsberg district in Styria . It is consecrated to St. Barbara and belongs to the Voitsberg deanery . The church is a listed building . The church, built in the post-war period , was redesigned in 1987/1988 by the Austrian artist Friedensreich Hundertwasser . In 2016 the tower roof and the six spheres on the church roof were newly gilded.

history

The parish church was built between 1948 and 1950 or 1952 according to the plans of the architect Karl Lebwohl and consecrated on May 21, 1950 or October 27, 1957. After the end of the Second World War, the chaplain Franz Derler wanted to look after the children of the Bärnbach miners better, which is why he, together with the Piber pastor Fleiter, came up with the idea of ​​building a church with a rectory and children's home in Bärnbach. Both brought a plan to the Ordinariate in May 1948 , but the planned church building was not without controversy both within the church and among the population of Bärnbach and Hochtregist . The miners as well as the workers in the nearby glass factory sometimes drove shifts for the benefit of the planned church. After a first district-wide house collection , the groundbreaking ceremony took place on October 21, 1948 by the Catholic youth of Ligist without an official building permit. This was only subsequently requested from the Ordinariate in February 1949 and the official laying of the foundation stone took place on Easter Monday 1949 by Auxiliary Bishop Leo Pietsch . The topping-out ceremony was celebrated in the summer of the same year . On June 4, 1950, the first youth lesson took place in the sacristy .

On December 31, 1951, Bärnbach was raised to an independent parish after the place had previously been divided between the parishes of Piber and Voitsberg . The church organ was inaugurated on December 4, 1955 and the parish kindergarten opened in 1956. The first primacy in the newly created parish took place on July 27, 1958. A parish council has existed since 1970 . In 1979 the local council decided to completely refurbish the parish church and in 1984 the pastor Friedrich Zeck came into contact with Friedensreich Hundertwasser through the stamp engraver Wolfgang Seidel, who lives in Bärnbach . Hundertwasser presented an initial model of the redesigned church in April 1987 after initial objections from some parish representatives, which were largely implemented. On October 12, 1987, the renovation work began by Hundertwasser in collaboration with the architect Manfred Fuchsbichler and lasted until the summer of 1988. Hundertwasser waived a fee for his work and paid for the gilding of the church tower himself. Of the 16.5 to 17 million schillings required for the redesign, around 7 million each came from the parish itself and from the diocese of Graz-Seckau and around 3 Millions from the municipality of Bärnbach. On July 2nd, 1988 the new tower onion was put on and on September 4th of the same year the church was consecrated by Bishop Johann Weber . On December 2, 1991, a new organ was ordered from Rieger Orgelbau for around 3.3 million schillings, which was inaugurated on September 4, 1994. From June to October 2016, the balls on the church roof and the tower bulb, which was lifted from the church tower, were re-gilded.

description

View of the altar cross
View of the organ gallery

The parish church was built according to the plans of architect Karl Lebwohl as a simple single - nave hall church facing north with a tower facing south. In the north-west there is a small annex with a semicircular end, the value or weekday chapel, which can be entered both from the outside and from the inside. The church and the surrounding area were redesigned in 1987/88 by Friedensreich Hundertwasser . The facade of the church was redesigned by Hundertwasser with colorful ceramic appliqués and the roof was given a colorful engobe . The tower onion of the church tower is gold plated and are on the roof of the church ten also gold-plated, different size balls. The depiction of angels and the symbols of the four evangelists are based on designs by Josef Papst, while the symbol designs for the west side of the tower come from Franz Weiss . There is also a sundial on the church tower as well as 14 Christian symbols and two rectangles on the west side still show the original color of the facade. There are a total of four bells in the church tower.

The nave is covered by a wooden ceiling with a flat arch. Friedensreich Hundertwasser shaped the originally retracted choir with a flat altar wall and a round opening on the ceiling into a rectangular apse for the altar cross and redesigned the floor of the choir. The larger than life altar cross, created by Franz Weiss, bears a baroque figure of Christ, which was made by Philipp Jakob Straub in the first half of the 18th century and was originally in the church on the Holy Mountain . The figure of Christ originally created by Franz Weiss for this cross was brought to the chapel in the Peter-Leitner-Siedlung. To the altar cross around there is a designed by Hundertwasser halo with 21 beams. The four candlesticks in the chancel, made of glass rods, were designed by Friedrich Ehrbar. The people's altar , made of glass and filled with twelve different layers of earth from the mining areas of western Styria and from holy places, as well as the ambo , which is also glass and filled with earth, come from Erwin Talker. The image of Santa Barbara on the former site of the pit Oberdorf on winged altar dates as well as the Gospels and the tabernacle of Franz Weiss. Other works by Franz Weiss are the figures of Our Lady and Saint Joseph . At the tabernacle there is a glass angel made by Zvonka Pozun. Gustav Troger made the altar in the weekday chapel from 690 square glass panels, while the anteroom to the chapel was designed by Hundertwasser. The glass windows were a donation from the Adolf Körbitz glass factory, of which the Barbara window and the John the Baptist window were made in 1988 in the Schlierbach Abbey glass workshop based on designs by Franz Weiss . The stained glass window with a color spiral behind the baptismal font comes from Hundertwasser . The five stained glass windows in the weekday chapel were designed by Otto Brunner in 1950 on behalf of the Oberdorf glass factory . The nativity scene in the church was carved by Franz Weiss, while the pictures of the Stations of the Cross , consecrated on February 17, 1989, are by Rudolf Poitner. The symbols of the Lord's Prayer on the parapet of the choir come from Kurt Zisler. Today's organ with 21 registers and 1300 organ pipes was inaugurated in 1994 and comes from the Rieger Orgelbau company .

The area around the church was paved differently, irregularly and wavy according to Hundertwasser's designs. Around the church there are 22 archways as well as several ceramic columns, which were designed by Hundertwasser and have numerous symbols of the great cultures and world religions and which should provide answers to the great questions of life. The war memorial designed by the architect Friedrich Abel by the church shows a mosaic created by Franz Weiss in 1958 , which shows the risen Christ with three fallen soldiers. Hundertwasser adapted it to the newly designed church area. The statue of Saint Barbara with protective cloak, which is in front of the church, was made by Alfred Schlosser .

Web links

Commons : Parish church Bärnbach  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Styria - immovable and archaeological monuments under monument protection. ( Memento of May 10, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) . Federal Monuments Office , as of June 28, 2013 (PDF).
  2. ^ History. www.baernbach.graz-seckau.at, accessed on March 18, 2019 .
  3. ↑ Bundesdenkmalamt (Ed.): Dehio Steiermark (excluding Graz) . 2nd Edition. Berger, Horn / Vienna 2006, ISBN 3-85028-439-5 , p. 41 .
  4. ^ A b Ernst Reinhold Lasnik : Bärnbach . From village to city. Municipality of Bärnbach, Bärnbach 2007, p.  373 .
  5. ^ A b c Walter Brunner (Ed.): History and topography of the Voitsberg district . tape 2 . Steiermärkisches Landesarchiv, Graz 2011, p. 19 .
  6. ^ A b c d e f Walter Brunner (Ed.): History and topography of the Voitsberg district . tape 2 . Steiermärkisches Landesarchiv, Graz 2011, p. 20 .
  7. ^ A b Ernst Reinhold Lasnik : Bärnbach . From village to city. Municipality of Bärnbach, Bärnbach 2007, p.  382 .
  8. ^ A b Ernst Reinhold Lasnik : Bärnbach . From village to city. Municipality of Bärnbach, Bärnbach 2007, p.  373-374 .
  9. ↑ Half a kilo of gold leaf for the sky. In: Small newspaper . www.kleinezeitung.at, October 23, 2016, accessed on April 5, 2019 (German).
  10. ↑ a b The artists and their works. www.baernbach.graz-seckau.at, accessed on April 6, 2019 .
  11. ^ A b Ernst Reinhold Lasnik : Bärnbach . From village to city. Municipality of Bärnbach, Bärnbach 2007, p.  378 .
  12. ^ Ernst Reinhold Lasnik : Bärnbach . From village to city. Municipality of Bärnbach, Bärnbach 2007, p.  383 .

Coordinates: 47 ° 4 ′ 13 ″  N , 15 ° 7 ′ 32.2 ″  E