Pilgrimage Church of St. Leonhard (Kaufering)
The Catholic pilgrimage church of St. Leonhard is located a few hundred meters south of Kaufering ( Landsberg am Lech district , Upper Bavaria ) on the Lech high bank . The small baroque sacred building was fundamentally renovated from 1975. The associated Leonhardi trip has been carried out annually since 1974.
history
Founding legend
According to a legend , the miraculous image was washed up by the floods of the Lech in the second half of the 17th century. A local resident set up the wooden Leonhard figure in the hollow of an oak tree, but later found it on a meadow. The sculpture was brought back to the tree, and shortly afterwards the sculpture was back at the location of the later church. This is said to have been repeated a few times.
Around 1704 it was decided to build a wooden pilgrimage chapel. The location was determined by the saint himself.
Building history
This wooden chapel collapsed in 1712. The pilgrimage was already so popular in the area that the community started building a new stone building. This church was in 1723 by the Augsburg Bishop of Mayr Johann Jakob consecrated to be. However, the furnishings were not completed until 1765.
In the 1970s, the poor state of construction made extensive renovation necessary. A donation campaign made it possible to carry out an extensive general renovation, which was supplemented by another interior renovation in 1999.
The builder of the small church is not documented. However, style comparisons assign the building to Michael Natter (1649–1719). The master probably took his Leonhard Church in Utting am Ammersee as a model . The structure of both sacred buildings is very similar.
description
Exterior construction
The church stands lonely in the Lechwiese. The structure consists of Tuscan pilasters with slender arched windows between them. On the west gable sits a reconstructed, octagonal roof turret with an onion hood.
The choir is slightly drawn in, so narrower than the nave and closes in three sides of the octagon. The tiled roof is lowered compared to the gable roof of the nave, and inside the presbytery is lower than the parish room.
The two wrought-iron chains around the church are an ingredient of the 1975 restoration. Such chains can be found around numerous Leonhard churches. St. Leonhard is the patron saint of cattle and was therefore especially revered in rural areas.
In the niche above the north portal there is a replica of the original miraculous image.
Furnishing
Frescoes
The large ceiling fresco shows St. Leonhard as intercessor of the rural population before Maria and St. Trinity. The popularly designed representation is attributed to the Munich master Franz Seraph Kirzinger (1730 – around 1795) and was created around 1765. In the west you can see a view of the church, but it is shortened by one axis. Six blue and red grisaille paintings are arranged around the main fresco, depicting the church patron as helpers and saints.
Kirzinger also created the choir fresco depicting the veneration of St. Leonhard themed through three continents.
Above the choir arch, a painted drapery frames a chronogram , which reveals three important dates from the building history:
SAN C TO L EONAR D O LI BERA PRO MI S I T P I ETAS (= 1704)
D E V OTA KA V FR I NGANA C ON DIDI T LI BERA LI TAS (= 1715)
MV N I F IC A C ORONA VI T PRO DI GA LI TAS (= 1765)
(For example: Unconstrained piety promised it to St. Leonhard. Kauferinger generosity built it into this promise and generous decorativeness crowned it)
Altars
The high altar with its double column positions was built around 1765 in rococo forms . The focus is on the patron saint St. Leonhard. The sculpture with the iron chain is a late work by Lorenz Luidl (around 1715). The Landsberg master also created the side figure of St. Catherine. St. Magnus with the dragon on the south side (around 1730/50). The small window opening in the apex of the choir is included as a Holy Spirit window in the extract (essay) and is framed by a glory of rays.
The two baroque side altars are still part of the original equipment (around 1715). Two twisted pairs of columns flank shell niches in which a crescent Madonna and St. Anthony of Padua. Lorenz Luidl created the figure of the saint with the baby Jesus for the right side altar. In the niche of the left counterpart stands the important Mother of God on the crescent moon, which is often attributed to Hans Degler's son David ( Weilheim , around 1670)
Other equipment
There are numerous large votive candles in the choir , which document the unbroken significance of the Kaufering Leonhardi pilgrimage. Of the old votive pictures, only one panel from 1879 has survived.
A crucifixion group by Lorenz Luidl (1717) hangs in front of a painted curtain on the south wall of the nave.
The organ with its prospect in neurococo forms (upper gallery) is a creation of the Biberach company Albert Reiser (1975). On the occasion of the restoration at that time, the peal was supplemented by a third bell, the two old bells are dated 1725.
literature
- Georg Dehio : Handbook of the German art monuments : Bavaria. Volume 4: Ernst Götz: Munich and Upper Bavaria. 3rd updated edition. Deutscher Kunstverlag, Munich et al. 2006, ISBN 3-422-03115-4 .
- Karen Schaelow-Weber, Norbert Marxer: Kaufering, St. Johannes Bapt. Kunstverlag Peda , Passau 2002, ISBN 3-89643-176-5 ( Peda art guide 170).
Web links
Coordinates: 48 ° 5 ′ 3.1 ″ N , 10 ° 52 ′ 41 ″ E