Günther Herr, Schloss Fischbach / Fischbach Castle

this picture and the next two courtesy of Gwyn Headley

On October 13, 2014, Gwyn Headley, a Welshman who published a lot about follies, added an article on the fotoLibra weblog From Harlech & London, describing how he, driving his car near Fischbach in Germany, came to a halt in a traffic jam and, when looking around through the brush along the road, catched a glimpse of what appeared to be some kind of castle, 

As a lover of follies, he did not hesitate to turn around and he managed to approach the building via a side road. It turned out to be a folly indeed, made by someone with the initials GH according to a designation on the gate around the building. The gate was closed and there was no one around to talk to about this singular architecture.

The two photos above and the one below give an idea of what kind of creation mr Headley found near Fischbach. In his article he asked if anyone knew more about this special structure, but it remained silent. just as I in 2014 could not find any further information.

 

However, I saved Headley's article for future reference and in 2022 I found the information about the site I used to edit the now following text.

.

Life and works

The initials GH represent Günther Herr, born in Fischbach in 1927, now in his mid-90s and -as far as I know- still actively involved in the creation he began to realize in 1967 at age forty. Mr Günther Herr is described as someone a little special, but very warm and open. Apart from his construction activities, in his spare time he likes to play the violin and make paintings

When young Günther left primary school in 1944, Germany was still at war, and just 16 years old he was called up for military service. After Germany had capitulated he was made a prisoner of war, from which he was released in June 1945. 

this picture and the next six, 

screenprints from the video in the documentation

As a young man, Günther wanted to be a forest ranger, but he was unable to realize that dream and instead trained as a carpenter, to work in construction for many decades afterwards.

Günther Herr settled in Kelkheim, the municipality of which Fischbach, with about 5900 inhabitants. is part. 

Near a creek that crosses Fischbach, Günther Herr acquired a piece of land. Around 1977 the B455 through road would be built close to that site or perhaps partly through it, because it is mentioned that Herr's site was reduced in size.

In any case, there was enough room left for the castle and adjacent structures Günther Herr was building.

Inspired by the famous Neuschwanstein Castle in Bavaria, Germany, Günther Herr built his creation from stones he collected in the area and transformed with cement into building elements of washed concrete. The proximity of the creek was very favorable for this washing. All kinds of other materials, such as unused old household objects,  unnecessary furniture, old car parts, whatever, also got a new destination during construction.

The fairytale appearance of Fischbach Castle is also reflected in the slender towers that adorn the structure and the use of colorful elements in its construction.

Günther Herr's creation is a fine addition to the modest range of art environments known in Germany, compared to France, for example. With a single article in a regional newspaper. this site got only modest publicity.

Gunther Herr at age 94

Dcumenation

* Article (October 2014) by Gwyn Headley in weblog fotoLibra

* Article (August 2016) in newspaper Frankfurter Neue Presse

Günther Herr

Fischbach Castle

Fischbach, municipality of Kelkheim, dept Main-Taurus, federal state Rheinland-Pfalz, Germany

can be seen from the road

Joseph Méray, Jardin decoré / Decorated garden

this photo and the next one courtesy of Francis David
from the website Habitants-Paysagistes 
© Lille Art Museum © Francis David

Very impressive, the elephant sculpture of 2000 kilos shown above. It is a 1960s creation made by Joseph Méray (1922-2019) to embellish the surroundings of his home in Merlimont in the Pas-de-Calais department in northwestern France.

Life and works

Born in the early 1920s, young Joseph Méray, due to family circumstances. was soon placed in an orphanage. 

The director of the house was impressed by the boy's slumbering artistic talent when there was a sand figure competition and he created a beautiful elephant. At that time there was no possibility for the director to arrange an art education and Meray would get a profession as a tailor.

sculpture of a bull in the front yard

Once grown up, Joseph Méray married Marie Ternaux. The couple initially lived in the town of Arras and would get five children. In the 1950s, the family moved to Merlimont, where they settled in an unfinished house. meaning Méray had to work hard to complete it.

The house was located in a dune-like area along the road to Merlimont Plage, a beach resort along the English Channel (between France and England).

Creating an art environment 

Once Méray had completed the work on the house in the early 1960s, he began to brighten up the house and its surroundings with decorations and creations. He made sculptures of animals, which got a place in the garden along the street, but it also happened that on a dune near the house he created the large elephant as depicted in the photo that opens this post.

In the early 1980s, Francis David visited the site and took photographs that would be published in his book Guide de l'art insolite: Nord-Pas-de-Calais, Picardie (1984) and later were added to the website Habitants-paysagistes started in March 2018 by the Lille Art Museum.

The decorated garden, as it stood in the 1980s, probably continued in this size in the following decades, both because of the limited size of the front garden and because of Méray's choice to focus on making small, wooden sculptures intended for indoor use.

what's left of the front garden in 2019
picture from Google Streetview

Joseph Méray passed away on December 27, 2019 at age 97. 

The picture above (2019) gives an idea of what, visible from the street, was left of the front garden: an arrangement of small items, flanked by a small elephant and a small bull.

In 2020 Sonia Terhzaz, a researcher from Paris of French art environments, visited the widow Marie Méray-Ternaux, who told her that the path along the side of the house included several sculptures, but that after creations were stolen or vandalized, the remaining ones were moved to a walled backyard or housed with relatives, as also was done with a part of Méray's wooden sculptures.

What happened to the colossal elephant wasn't clear, until Rudy Méray commented that it is now located in a courtyard on the edge of a small pond in a small village near Montreuil sur Mer, 14 km east of Merlimont.ation

* Website Habitants-paysagistes (Lille Art Museum)

* Francis David, Guide de l'art insolite: Nord-Pas-de-Calais, Picardie (1984)

* Article about he site by Sonia Terhzaz, reporting  visits she paid in March 2020 and December 2022

Joseph Méray

752 rue Camille Delacroix, 

62155 Merlimont,  dept Pas-de-Calais, region Hauts-de-France

can be seen from the road 

streetview

Gessica Mancini and friends, Scena natalizia all'uncinetto / Crochet Christmas scene

picture (December 2022) from the Facebook page of the 
Empolese Valdelsa and Montalbano Tourist Area,
between Florence and Pisa: land of art

In  a previous post attention was paid to a Christmas scene in Italy created by Tiziana Busi, a site located in Pieve di Cento in Italy,  decorated with people and buildings made of crochet. 

Surprised by the use of crochet, further research into this aspect revealed that there are more crocheted Christmas scenes in Italy. The following post describes the crotched scene created by Gessica Mancini from the community of Cerreto Guidi, a municipality in the metropolitan area of Florence. 

Both sites are among the largest creations of Christmas scenes in Italy.

this picture and the next ones from the Facebook page of 

"Le dame dell' uncinetto"

Life and works

Born in 1973, Gessica Mancini learned how to crochet at a very young age. She attended the Istituto statale d'arte, a high school that focuses on the fields of culture, art and crafts. Subsequently she worked at a company doing craft carpentry..

Married in 1997, Gessica got three children. In 2013, when she was just 40 years old, a major event occurred in her life: she was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease.

To get away from the thoughts she got because of that diagnosis and to relax a bit, she started crocheting a Christmas scene, because as she said: "When I work for the crib, I don't think about anything and it distracts me from wrong thoughts"

Her choice to make a Christmas scene may also be related to a tradition that from around 2010 was developing in her hometown of Cerreto Guidi: the idea to organize in December as Christmas approaches a competition La via dei Presepi (The Road of the Cribs). 

From early December to early January there would be a public display of around a hundred nativity scenes made by private persons, situated along a route in the inner city along shops, libraries and other public places, with a prize for the most beautiful scene.

In 2014, Gessica took part in this competition and with her newly, still small crocheted nativity scene of 1.5 meters she won the first prize.

When making her Christmas crib, she was assisted by some crocheters from the area, this via a call on Facebook. 

The first prize encouraged her and the other women involved to continue their creative project and so today (2023) the nativity scene has grown considerably. With a length of 30 m it is one of the largest in Italy

The Christmas scene shows characters and buildings from the community of Cerreto Guidi, as well as scenes of gardens and fields in the rural area around the city.

A striking item is the replica of the 16th century hunting lodge of the Medici family, depicted above and below, with an impressive staircase designed by he 16th century architect Bernardo Buontalenti. 

This staircase is composed of 7,000 crocheted stones of 4 cm each, so beautifully made that they look like real stones.

In addition to this famous building, there are replicas of all kinds of historic and other buildings, but also replicas of shops. markets and other public places from the village of Cerreto Guidi, all made with attention to the smallest details and everything rigorously crocheted.

The scenes ar often full of people and one can also meet well-known characters of the community, such as the local priest or the butcher. The scenes of the countryside in the area show vegetable and flower gardens, with fruits and flowers depicted in detail.

A group of some fifty crochet ladies.

The small group of people who had assisted Gessica Mancini in the very beginning, grew over the years. It became an association of more than 50 women, of all ages and living in all kinds of places in Italy. 

In consultation with Gessica Mancini they make entire scenes or parts of scenes, such as walls, bricks, parts of the street or certain costumes, which are often sent by parcel post when the contributing lady lives further away.

The association, referred to in Italian as LE DAME DELL'UNCINETT0 (The ladies of crochet) has its own page on Facebook.

A nationwide inventory of Christmas nativity scenes

Italy has a centuries-old tradition of nativity scenes, which began with Saint Francis of Assisi, who created the first nativity scene in history in 1223 in a cave just outside the old hill town of Greccio in the region of Lazio.

The county has a large number of cities and villages where nativity scenes are installed in public spaces or in churches and other meeting places.

There is now a National Association of Cities of Cribs, chaired by the mayor of Cerreto Guidi. which, at the end of October 2022, together with the Ministry of Culture started mapping cribs in Italy. In addition to data on number and location, the working group, coordinated by the Central Institute for Intangible Heritage of the Ministry of Culture, also investigates immaterial aspects, such as the history of the creation, the skills, knowledge and motivation of the makers and the involvement of local residents. 

Wouldn't it be a good idea to start this context in some way a project focused on an investigation of the artistic aspects of Christmas cribs in Italy ?

Documentation

* Facebook-account Le Dame dell'uncinetto, with information about opening days/hours

* Article in travel blog Amiche in Wanderlust, with a variety of pictures

* Article (November 2021) in newspaper Valdelsa.net

* Article by Margherita Cecchin in newspaper la Repubblica (December 2022)

Videos

* Video on Facebook by Italia on the road with an overview of a large part of the Christmas scene

* Video (2018) on the Facebook page of Le Dame dell' uncinetto

Gessica Mancini 

Scena natalizia

Via Santi Saccenti 53

Cerreto Guidi, area of metropolitan Florence, regio Tuscany, Italy 

visitors welcome (see FB-page for opening days/hours

streetview

Tiziana Busi, Decorazioni natalizie all'uncinetto in una cappella / Crochet Christmas decorations in a chapel

this picture and the next one (December 2022)

by Barbara Busi (as on Google Maps)

The picture above shows the Christmas decorations in the Cappella Di Santa Chiara in the old center of Pieve di Cento, a community of about 6800 inhabitants in Italy, 30 km north of Bologna.

This Christmas scene is a special one, not only because, at 100 m², it is among the largest in Italy, but also because of the crochet work that has been done to create the variety of characters.

Life and work

There is virtually no biographical information available on the internet about Tiziana Busi, the artist who made these special Christmas decorations. She lives in Pieve di Cento and was probably also born and raised there.

When exactly she started making crocheted characters for a Christmas scene is not clear, but it is known that in December 2022 the exhibition took place for the seventh time.

This for the chapel annual event, entitled Gaudete et exultate: nato per farci santi (Rejoice and be glad: Born to make us saints), usually takes place from Christmas Day in December to mid-January, 

 

this picture and he next four courtesy of Francesco Galli,
from his website

Apart from the traditional figures included in a nativity scene, such as Joseph and Mary with the newborn Jesus, shepherds from the area and the three kings from further afield, Tiziana's creation is populated by all kinds of characters who go about their daily activities, inserted in urban and rural and scenes.

The site includes creations that depict famous people from the Roman Catholic world, such as Mother Teresa (1910-1997), Pope Francis (appointed 2013), Cardinal Giacomo Biffi (Archbishop of Bologna 1928-2015). 

And there are creations depicting well known people from a completely different world, such as the Italian boxer from Pieve di Cento  Franco Cavicchi (1928-2018).

Seen from the field of art environments, this Christmas scene is special because of the various buildings that are part of it. 

At first glance it may not be so clear, but the outside of these buildings is covered with crocheted material, designed in such a way that windows and doors, but also columns and roofs, appear realistic. This also applies to the pavement. 

For residents of Pieve di Cento it must be a nice experience to see replicas of the local parochial church Santa Maria Maggiore and of the four gates that mark the main access roads of the city, the Porta Asia , Porta Cento, Porta Bologna and the Porta Ferrara.

And there are also buildings further away such as the St. Peter's Basilica in Rome and churches from nearby Bologna, such as the Santuario di Madonna di San Luca and the Saint Petronius Basilica.

Documentation

* Article on the website of photographer Francesco Galli, with pictures

* Video

On Facebook Watch there is a video (11'16") with scenes from this art environment. Although it can be shared, after sharing the video appears as inaccessible.

Tiziana Busi 

Christmas decorations in the Cappella Di Santa Chiara

22 Via Luigi Galuppi

Pieve di Cento, dept Bologna, region Emilia-Romagna, Italy

freely accessible between December 25 and mid-January

Google Maps