Notre-Dame goes Disney
Renovation risks turning cathedral into ‘politically-correct theme park’
THE rebuilt Notre-Dame risks becoming a ‘politically correct Disneyland’, it was claimed yesterday.
Modern art murals could replace confessional boxes, altars and classical sculptures under the proposals for the fireravaged monument.
Sound and light effects will create ‘emotional spaces’, with visitors led to 14 themed chapels on a ‘discovery trail’.
Quotations from the Bible will be projected on to walls in languages including Mandarin.
The plans have caused uproar in France, with critics claiming the medieval cathedral will be turned into an ‘experimental liturgical showroom’.
Maurice Culot, a prize-winning Paris-based architect who has seen the plans, said: ‘It’s as if Disney were entering Notre-Dame.
‘What they are proposing to do would never be done to Westminster Abbey or Saint Peter’s in Rome. It’s a kind of theme park, and very childish and trivial given the grandeur of the place.’
A senior source close to the renovation claimed the proposals would ‘mutilate’ the work of Eugene Viollet-le-Duc, who restored the cathedral following the ravages of the
‘Very childish and trivial’
French Revolution. They said: ‘This is political correctness gone mad.
‘They want to turn Notre-Dame into an experimental liturgical showroom – it should be a landmark where the slightest change must be handled with great care.
‘Can you imagine the administration of the Holy See allowing something like this in the Sistine Chapel?’
On April 15, 2019, millions of people across the world watched in horror as fire crews battled through the night to save the cathedral as flames tore through its roof and toppled the steeple.
Fire-damaged parts of the 850year-old building will be restored to their former condition, but other areas will be transformed. Under plans presented by Father Gilles Drouin, head of the Archdiocese of Paris team overseeing the development, the 14 themed chapels will depict Genesis, Abraham, Exodus and the Prophets, as well as the five continents – with Africa and Asia having pride of place.
Christian Rousselot, director general of the Notre-Dame Foundation, in charge of handling the lion’s share of £700million raised in donations, said the discovery trail will ‘provide the keys to half the planet that doesn’t know what a cathedral is’.
Jean-Louis Georgelin, who was given the role of rebuilding NotreDame by Emmanuel Macron, has pledged that it will be sufficiently restored by 2024, in time for the Olympic Games in Paris.