Zwinglikirche (Vienna)

East view of the Zwingli Church

The Zwinglikirche is an evangelical-reformed church building in the 15th Viennese district Rudolfsheim-Fünfhaus . The church was built from 1936 to 1937 according to plans by the architects Siegfried Theiss and Hans Jaksch .

Location and architecture

The listed church is located at Schweglerstraße 39 in the Neu-Fünfhaus district . It does not border on any other buildings, but is surrounded by streets all around. The Zwingligasse, so named in 1937, runs behind the church .

1937 was also the year in which the church construction begun in 1936 by architects Siegfried Theiss and Hans Jaksch was completed. The U-shaped complex consists of the church, the adjoining two-story rectory and the one-story sexton's apartment connected to it. These three elements are grouped around a square inner courtyard, which is closed off by a wall with a lattice gate on the main front. A bell that is freely visible from the outside hangs in the small church tower. The rectory, the sacristy and the parish hall for 130 people are located in the rectory. The church forecourt facing Schweglerstrasse is separated from the sidewalk by a different shape and color.

The simple interior of the church is dominated by the red wall on the head side, on which there is gold-colored lettering with a biblical quote ( Joh. 14,6) in the translation of the Luther Bible : I am the way, the truth and the life: nobody comes to the father then through me. The wall at the top was originally dark blue-gray. The motto was initially: Jesus Christ yesterday and today and the same for all eternity . Below is the communion table on a raised area that can be reached via three steps. The colorful church windows on the north side, one of which is dedicated to the Swiss reformer and namesake of the church, Ulrich Zwingli , date from 1955 in their current form. On the wooden pulpit there has been a relief by the sculptor Karl Jedlicka since 1946 of the Zwinglikopf. The organ gallery above the main portal is partially clad with wood.

In the Protestant church in Austria in the First Republic, the Zwinglikirche together with the Cross Church and the Transfiguration the culmination of the development is to abandon traditional church architectural outline principles and functionality give a high priority.

history

The parish of Vienna-West located in the church is one of nine parishes of the Evangelical Church HB in Austria . It goes back to a preaching station of the Reformed City Church created in 1901 on the basis of a donation from the entrepreneur Philipp Wilhelm von Schoeller in the amount of 100,000 crowns . The preaching station was in the Volkscafé at Thaliastraße 41 in the 16th district of Ottakring . This was initially the seat of the independent parish of Vienna-West, which was established in 1924 and whose first pastor Johann Karl Egli later - from 1947 to 1952 - held the highest office in the Evangelical Church of HB as superintendent. Not least because of the wave of social democrats who passed over since the Austrian Civil War of 1934 and the associated increase in the number of members of the congregation, it became necessary to set up a separate church building.

The building site for the Zwingli Church was the community's former children's playground, which had meanwhile been given to the City of Vienna. The foundation stone was laid on September 27, 1936, the dedication of the Zwingli Church took place on June 20, 1937. Among the Swiss reformers, the eponym Ulrich Zwingli has a special connection to Vienna insofar as he also studied at the University of Vienna . For the architecture firm Theiss & Jaksch, the design of the church came at a time of personal artistic and financial uncertainty. The construction of the Herrengasse high-rise meant an economic failure for Theiss & Jaksch. In 1932 they ran into financial problems. Because of the generally poor economic situation, they received only a few orders. Their uncertainty is reflected in the rather traditionalist and modest design of the Zwingli Church. During the aerial warfare in the Second World War , a bomb hit on April 12, 1945 caused major damage to the roof of the church and the rectory. The subsequent renovation of the Zwingli Church was already completed in March 1946.

The satirist Alfred Heinrich headed the community as curator from 1984 to 1997. From 1964 to 1998 Balázs Németh was pastor of the Zwingli Church. Thomas Hennefeld , his successor in this office, has been regional superintendent of the Evangelical Church HB in Austria since 2007.

literature

• Alexander Grabner: The church buildings and church designs by the architects Siegfried Theiß and Hans Jaksch . Diploma thesis, University of Vienna 2002.
• Balázs Németh: The Evangelical Parish HB Wien-West . In: Peter Karner (Ed.), The Evangelical Community HB in Vienna . Deuticke, Vienna 1986, ISBN 3-7005-4579-7 , pp. 194-196.
• Austrian Art: Monthly magazine for visual and performing arts, architecture and handicrafts . Issue 10, August 1937.

Web links

Commons : Zwinglikirche  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Evangelical parish HB Wien-West

Individual evidence

1. ^ Georg Schwalm-Theiss: Theiss & Jaksch. Architects 1907–1961 . Edition Christian Brandstetter, Vienna 1986, ISBN 3-85447-196-3 , pp. 83–84.
2. ↑ Herbert Unterköfler: Between Two Worlds - Notes on the Cultural Identity of Evangelicals in Austria . In: Spiritual life in Austria during the First Republic . Edited by Isabella Ackerl . Oldenbourg, Munich 1986, ISBN 3486537318 , p. 357.
3. ^ Georg Schwalm-Theiss: The architects Theiss & Jaksch 1907–1961 . In: Liesbeth Waechter-Böhm (ed.): Georg Schwalm-Theiss & Horst Gressenbauer: The tradition of a Viennese architecture office . Böhlau, Vienna / Cologne / Weimar 1999, ISBN 3-205-99127-3 , pp. 103-104.

Coordinates: 48 ° 11 '59.9 "  N , 16 ° 19' 36.2"  E