Piarist Church of Maria Treu

The Piarist Church of Maria Treu is a Baroque Roman Catholic parish church on Jodok-Fink-Platz in Vienna’s Josefstadt area.

History

The church’s name alludes to the Josefstadt miraculous figure of Maria Treu, which was painted by Josef Herz during the plague epidemic of 1713 and moved from today’s Chapel of Pain to the new church.After this painting, the patron saint became “Maria Treu” in 1721.

The church was erected from 1698 to 1719 as a religious order church of the Piarists, who also managed the Piarist high school in Josefstadt, most likely following to plans by Lukas von Hildebrandt.Sebastian Regondi and Joseph Winkler, skilled stonemasons, were in charge.

Mathias Gerl finished the conversion in 1753.

The church was repaired for the first time in 1890.The facade (Borrominesque serpentine) is the unique Viennese example of a convex facade in the style of Pietro da Cortona’s Roman churches of Santi Luca e Martina and Santa Maria della Pace.

Maria-Treu-Gasse in Josefstadt was named after the church in 1862, and the part of Piaristengasse right in front of the church in Jodok-Fink-Platz was named after the church in 1929.

With the apostolic exhortation Trecentesimum annum, Pope Pius XII raised the church to the rank of minor basilica on August 27, 1949.

Description

The church sits in the center of the square ensemble, with the Piarist College on the left wing, the Löwenburg Konvikt on the right, and the Marian column, given in 1713, in the centre.The two-tower facade features a column construction and a slightly arched middle part.The two towers, which were erected without a helmet in 1752, were elevated by the Bohemian master builder Franz Sitte between 1858 and 1860, equipped with pointed roofs, and the facade was given its current form.

The church’s interior features an extraordinarily intricate floor layout.The cruciform central room’s center is a nearly circular oval with a flat dome flanked by six side altars.The ceiling paintings are a monumental work by Franz Anton Maulbertsch: five dome frescoes painted in 1752 and 1753 by Austria’s most famous late Baroque painter.The main dome shows Mary’s Assumption, while the rim includes events from the Old and New Testaments.All of the figures are linked, like a raging river, and color takes precedence over shape in the arrangement.The structure of Daniel Gran, the early Paul Trogerand subsequently in classicism, favors the play of light and color.

Vienna, Austria