St. Canice’s Cathedral: Painting on W. wall of chapter house (Lady Chapel). Does this still survive today?
Prof. Edwin C. Rae was Professor of the History of Art at the University of Illinois, Champagne-Urbana. During World War II he was Fine Arts Chief for the military government in Bavaria and responsible for returning thousands of art objects looted from conquered countries by the Germans. The subject of his Harvard Ph.D dissertation however, was the Architecture of Medieval Ireland and in the later years of his career he published a number of important articles on the subject, all illustrated with photographs from this collection. In 2001 Prof. Rae donated his photographs to the History of Art Department at TCD. Since 2003 they have been administered by the Irish Art Research Centre (TRIARC) as part of their larger archive of Irish art.
The collection of photographs, which date to c.1930-1970 are focussed principally on Irish Later Medieval (c.1250-1600AD) tomb sculpture, wayside crosses, architecture and architectural detailing. Monuments from nearly all counties, including the North of Ireland are represented, and there is a small collection of comparative material from England and France. Holdings are particularly significant for counties Kilkenny and Dublin, areas which formed the focus of a number of Rae’s publications. The collection includes material in state-, church- and privately-owned monuments as well as some museum material.
Figure of an angel on the west doorway St. Canice’s cathedral. ‘Restoration’ of this doorway in the 1990s more-or-less destroyed most of the the medieval carvings over the west door.
Rae’s Kilkenny collection comprises over 400 photographs (and the occasional drawing) of medieval ecclesiastical sculpture from the county. St. Canice’s cathedral and St. Mary’s parish church figure prominently. The Kilkenny material is available here.