Statue of Mary

Thanks, i am hesitating how to make the sculpture more attractive now that all the plaster and colors are gone, perhaps dark wax

And if i should restore the gaps between the wooden ‘shelves’

 

Yes, wonder what that was? Maybe there was a piece of wood to which her sacred heart was attached. She looks like a sacred heart Madonna, with that hand pointing to her chest. Someone wanted her heart.

It is that loveliness factor isn't it.

 

The gaps were always there from the start. They would have been covered by the plaster before the statue was painted. It is just something the person who stripped her hadn't thought of. Which may have been why she was sold and ended up with you. There is a lesson here, never strip a Madonna.

She is still very beautiful though, letterbox and all.

 

i like the way they put boards together to carve her......
was that a thing in the Low Country.....or were large trees not available ??

 

maybe a hidden screw or two just to stabilize her....might be an idea..?

 

Lack of money of the fledgling Catholic parishes, I think. After centuries of hidden churches in attics etc, they suddenly had to furnish complete church buildings.

 

I thought the reason was that solid wood would crack more easily

 

so they used the same wood.......maybe cast off boards....that they made the building of................ hummm....

 

The state supplied many of the buildings. Some were the big old Medieval churches that had been used by a dozen Protestants for centuries. In those regions smaller chapels were built for the small Protestant congregations.
Where the Protestants really did need a big church, the state often built new churches for the Catholics.