HERITAGE TREASURES (Number 99)
By Brian Andrews, Archdiocesan Heritage Officer
In 1940, the Parish Priest of Cygnet, Fr Francis Kent (1898–1965), built a church in the Spanish Colonial Mission style for the town. Fr Kent had a lively interest in liturgical matters and created for his new church a high altar setting which included a baldacchino, or canopy, over the altar, based on the principles of the international Liturgical Movement.
The baldacchino, which highlighted the sacred nature of the altar, was seen by the Liturgical Movement as a key element dating back to the first centuries of Christendom, and worthy of reinstatement.
Within this setting, which has survived intact, was a crucifix with a carved, polychromed and gilded figure of Christ the King. Such a depiction of Jesus as king on the cross gained impetus across the Catholic world in the aftermath of the horrendous slaughter inflicted by World War One.
In 1925, in the midst of the consequent social and political chaos, Pope Pius XI instituted a new liturgical feast day of Christ the King to remind the world that Christ is the king of all humanity.
This was the background for Fr Kent’s choice of Christ the King for the crucifix in his new church, a choice very much in the Catholic spirit of the age. His love of the liturgy and of sacred art in the service of the Church led him to engage the important twentieth-century Australian artist Arthur Murch (1902–1989) to design and carve the crucifix.
Murch’s work is to be found in most major Australian art galleries. He was noted for both his sculptures and his paintings, winning the Archibald Prize for portraiture in 1949.
Murch was an official war artist during World War II and is represented by forty-seven works in the Australian War Memorial, Canberra. In 1925 he had won the NSW Travelling Art Scholarship, his wide travels in Italy resulting in his paintings being strongly influenced by the work of the Italian primitives and Renaissance artists.
It would appear that Murch had been introduced to Fr Kent by John Drummond Moore (1888–1958), the Sydney-based architect of the new Cygnet church of St James, as both men moved in the same artistic circles.
Murch’s warm relationship with Fr Francis Kent is evident in his letter dated 22 November 1940, just over six weeks after the opening of St James’, where he signed off with the words: ‘With sincerest wishes for a happy sojourn in your new church to you’.
Worth noting is that in 2015 the figure of Christ was brilliantly restored by the late Tony Colman, a historic furnishings master craftsman. One of the tall candles flanking it had charred Christ’s left wrist, and been on the verge of precipitating a disastrous blaze.