Mammern Castle Chapel
The Mammern Castle Chapel is a baroque sacred building within the former Mammern Castle on the Thurgau shores of the Untersee .
It can be described as a testimony to the climax of the Counter Reformation in Mammern. Its construction was inspired by the governor of the Rheinau monastery in Mammern, Roman Effinger and the abbot of the monastery at that time, Bernhard II. Rusconi, who laid the foundation stone on May 11, 1749. The chapel was provisionally inaugurated in December. The solemn consecration took place on July 14, 1750. The chapel is dedicated to the devotion of Mary .
Architecture and interior design
The architect was Johann Michael Beer (1696–1780) from Vorarlberg . The interior was designed by the Kempten painter Franz Ludwig Herrmann (1723–1791). Particularly noteworthy is the skilful pseudo-architecture of the altar pieces. The painted main altar is a quote from the actual altar as it can still be seen in the former Rheinau monastery church. In this way, the painter refers to his client in a coded late Baroque manner.
The pictorial design of the chapel follows a complex program of content: On the main altar, Mary with the child is shown handing a scapular to Saint Simon Stock . To the left is a painted statue of Maria's father, Joachim , and to the right, that of Mary's mother, Anna . The whole thing is presented in the style of the early Rococo by Franz Ludwig Hermann .
The picture on the left side altar shows Joseph dying in the arms of Jesus and Mary. The right side altar depicts the death of St. Benedict of Nursia , who died during mass. The central ceiling painting shows Mary as the Immaculate Conception floating in heaven. The round picture is surrounded by the representation of the four evangelists with their attributes. Further pictorial representations can be found of the four Latin church fathers , of Leopold III. , Margrave of Austria and founder of the monastery Neuburg, the Cardinal and of plague Charles Borromeo , of Empress Maria Theresa and Emperor Francis I .
To the left of the altar is the tomb of Commander Johann Walter von Roll († June 17, 1639). It was originally set up in the then parity parish church of St. Jakob zu Mammern and was outsourced when the Protestant church was rebuilt from 1666 to 1667. It represents the deceased as life-size and was created by the sculptor Hans Konrad Asper (around 1588 - around 1666).
The organ goes back to a South German instrument around 1770 and was restored or reconstructed in 1987 by Orgelbau Kuhn .
literature
- Beatrice Sendner-Rieger: The castle chapel of Mammern TG. ( Swiss Art Guide , No. 460). Society for Swiss Art History. Bern 1989, ISBN 978-3-85782-460-9 .
- Alfons Raimann, Peter Erni: Mammern - Castle Chapel. In: this: The Art Monuments of the Canton of Thurgau, Volume VI, Steckborn District. Society for Swiss Art History, Bern 2001, pp. 203–210.
