Palau 10 Dollars 2012 Silver Proof Sacred Art Holy Windows Cathedral of Brasília – Oscar Niemeyer

Description

The Cathedral of Brasília (Catedral Metropolitana Nossa Senhora Aparecida) is the Roman Catholic cathedral serving Brasília, Brazil, and serves as the seat of the Archdiocese of Brasília. It was designed by Oscar Niemeyer, and was completed and dedicated on May 31, 1970. The cathedral is a hyperboloid structure constructed from 16 concrete columns, weighing 90 tons each.
In the square access to the temple, are four bronze sculptures with three feet tall, representing the evangelists, the sculptures were made ​​with the aid of the sculptor Dante Croce in 1968. Inside the nave, are the sculptures of three angels, suspended by steel cables. The dimensions and weight of the carvings are 2.22 m long and the shorter one hundred kg, 3.40 m long and two hundred kilograms the average and 4.25 m in length and most three hundred kilograms. The sculptures are Alfredo Ceschiatti, with the collaboration of Dante Croce in 1970. The baptistery was ovoid in shape on your walls the panel in ceramic tiles painted in 1977 by Athos Bulcão. The tower consists of four large bells, donated by Spain, complete the architectural. The roof of the nave has a stained glass composed of sixteen pieces of fiberglass in shades of blue, green, white and brown inserted between the concrete pillars. Each piece is inserted into triangles with base ten meters and thirty feet high and were painted in 1990 by Marianne Peretti. The altar was donated by Pope Paul VI and the image of the patron saint Our Lady of Aparecida is a replica of the original which is in Aparecida – São Paulo. The Way of the Cross is a work of Di Cavalcanti. At the entrance of the cathedral, is a pillar with passages from the life of Mary, mother of Jesus, painted by Athos.

Artistic interpretation
The Cathedral of Brasilia, officially the Metropolitan Cathedral of Our Lady Aparecida (Catedral Metropolitana Nossa Senhora Aparecida), dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary under her title of Our Lady of Aparecida, proclaimed by the Church as Queen and Patroness of Brazil, is an expression of the architect Oscar Niemeyer.
This concrete-framed hyperboloid structure, seems with its glass roof to be reaching up, open, to heaven. On May 31, 1970, the Cathedral’s structure was finished, and only the 70 m diameter of the circular area were visible. Niemeyer’s project of Cathedral of Brasília is based in the hyperboloid of revolution which sections are asymmetric. The hyperboloid structure itself is a result of 16 identical assembled concrete columns. These columns, having hyperbolic section and weighing 90 t, represent two hands moving upwards to heaven. The Cathedral was dedicated on May 31, 1970.

History
Projected by an atheist, it took several years for the cathedral to be consecrated. While an awing structure, inducing reverence from its entrance — first an open-air aisle sided by statues of the evangelists, with the synoptics on one side and John on the other, and then a dark, silent tunnel, leading to the main, naturally-illuminated nave dominated by three hanging angels in different sizes, giving a perspective illusion of heavenly profundity — the cathedral has seen relatively little use, as its acoustics echoed, jumbled and made it practically impossible to hear homilies, and the natural illumination in a very sunny city was not offset by proper ventilation. Reforms ongoing during 2010 were planned to fix these issues and allow for full utilisation of the building.