Meditate with Augustin Frison-Roche (born in 1987)

Fires in cathedrals are an old story. In 1859, on the night of September 9 to 10, Cambrai Cathedral (North) underwent a terrible devastation by fire. The population is mobilizing, alongside firefighters, to save the main works of art and fight against flames.

An archive document also tells that three civilians injured during their intervention-a farrier, a servant and a upholsterer-will be compensated. Among the destroyed works, is a representation of the assumption of the Virgin Mary, who had survived the violence of the Revolution.

Since the disappearance of this canvas located 21 m in height, at the crossroads of the transept, this oculus – a large circular space – had become blind, replaced for a century and a half by a simple floor painted in green. With the project being renovated by the cathedral, the eyes have reopened and the desire to initiate an ambitious artistic project too.

The attentive look, turned towards the sky, will be able to recognize in the work of the French artist Augustin Frison-Roche different symbols and colors which refer to the other Marian treasure of the cathedral, the venerable icon Notre-Dame de Grâce. If this one invites to the tender interiority of the incarnation, the recent image of this new assumption in the heights of the vault, it, the hearts. Three angels deploy their wings of fire to accommodate all-in-the-floor in a circle of praise. Marie, closed eyes and open arms, lets herself be accommodated. The sky ignites when it kisses the earth.