Buren, Di Rosa, Pei-Ming among the hundred candidates competing to create the new contemporary stained glass windows of the cathedral

Around a hundred artists and craftsmen applied to create the future contemporary stained glass windows of Notre-Dame de Paris cathedral, according to a press release from the Ministry of Culture. They responded to an appeal launched by the public establishment Rebâtir Notre-Dame de Paris.

Daniel Buren, Hervé di Rosa, Yan Pei-Ming and Pascal Convert are among the few “110 files of artist duos and master glassmakers” candidates for the design of contemporary stained glass windows for Notre-Dame de Paris, the presidency of the artistic committee responsible for selecting them announced to AFP on Saturday.

“We received around 110 applications for tandems between an artist and a master glassmaker by the closing date, Friday”announced Bernard Blistène, president of this committee and honorary director of the National Museum of Modern Art, confirming information from Le Figaro.

Robert Combas, Laure Prouvost, Philippe Parreno, Jean-Michel Alberola, Jaume Plensa, Claire Tabouret and Barthélémy Togo are also among the artists who responded to the call for projects, according to Bernard Blistène, who “reserves the right to surprise” also selecting “lesser known artists”.

“A narrower list of validated files will be decided on June 14, then, on June 26, the artistic committee will select a list of around eight finalists which will be transmitted to the Archbishop of Paris, Mgr Laurent Ulrich, who will discuss it with the President of the Republic before selecting only one winner”he clarified.

Emmanuel Macron announced in December, while visiting the restoration site of the cathedral partially destroyed by a fire in 2019, that he was in favor of the installation of contemporary stained glass windows in six chapels on the south aisle of the nave (Seine side).

“The red thread chosen for the stained glass windows will be the tree of Jesse (a frequent motif in Christian art, which schematically represents the family tree of Jesus) and the speech of the prophet Isaiah” which speaks in particular of this tree, detailed Bernard Blistène.

The chapels which will house the future contemporary stained glass windows are currently adorned with 19th century stained glass windows, created by the architect Eugène Viollet-le-Duc, which will have to be dismantled. The new stained glass windows are not expected to be installed in the cathedral until 2026, according to the culture ministry.

Made up of 20 people, heritage curators, artists, members of the diocese of Paris, the public establishment responsible for the reconstruction project and the Ministry of Culture, the artistic committee was responsible for designating “a winning pair” in order to present a prototype for the reopening of the cathedral, scheduled for December 8, after a titanic five-year reconstruction project.

Its spire has been fully visible in the capital’s sky for weeks but the cathedral will not be reopened for the Paris Olympic Games, which begin on July 26. Its surroundings must subsequently be redeveloped, sector by sector, from 2025 to 2028.