St. John The Baptist Baptising Christ
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Location
| Street: | Bristol Road |
| Town: | Brighton |
| Parish: | Brighton |
| Council: | Brighton & Hove City Council |
| County: | East Sussex |
| Postcode: | BN1 |
| Location on Google Map | |
| Object setting: | Inside building |
| and in: | Religious |
| Access is: | Public |
| Location note: | In St. John the Baptist Church |
| In the AZ book: | East Sussex |
| Page: | 132 |
| Grid reference: | D9 |
| The A-Z books used are A-Z East Sussex and A-Z West Sussex (Editions 1A 2005). Geographers' A-Z Map Company Ltd. Sevenoaks. | |
| Previous location: | Behind the altar - moved 1885 |
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Makers
| Name : | John Edward Carew |
| Role: | Sculptor |
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General Information
| Commissioned by: | Lord Egremont |
| Construction period: | 1835 |
| Work is: | Extant |
| Building listing: | II* |
| Listing date: | 13/10/1952 |
| Description: | A relief of St. John the Baptist depicted in the act of baptising Christ. The relief stands behind the baptismal font. There is a dove carved in low relief above the two figures. |
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Classification
| Categories: | Sculptural, Religious |
| Object type1: | Relief |
| Subject type1: | Pictorial |
| Subject subtype1: | Group |
| Subject type2: | Figurative |
| Subject subtype1: | Full-length |
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Object Parts
| Part 1: | Entire relief |
| Material: | White marble |
| Height (cm): | 366 |
| Width (cm): | 245 |
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Object Condition
| Overall condition: | Good |
| Risk assessment: | No known risk |
| Condition 1 of type: | Structural |
| More details: | St. John's finger and the dove's beak were damaged when moved for restoration in 1997. The relief was cleaned and regilded during the restoration. |
| Date of on-site inspection: | 31/03/2005 |
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History
| History: | The Roman Catholic Church of St John the Baptist was designed and built between 1832 and 1835 by William Hallett with sculpture by John Carew. The east end was extended by 60 feet in 1875 to designs by Gilbert Robert Blount with further additions between 1887 and 1890. Wall decorations were carried out by by Nathaniel Hubert Westlake from 1890 to 1921. The baptistery, finished in 1889 and entered through a round diaphragm arch, contains the stone, low-relief sculpture of St John the Baptist and Christ. executed by Carew in c1835, which was the original altar piece.
In the south wall next to the organ gallery, monument to Maria Fitzherbert (1756-1837), the Catholic widow who was married to the Prince of Wales in 1783 and who was disowned by the Prince Regent in 1811, although she continued to frequent Brighton. The monument shows her as widow with the Lamp of Memory and kneeling before the broken gospels, assuming the form either of Fidelity or Religion. She is wearing 3 wedding rings as Catholic ecclesiastical law requires. She was patroness of this congregation. In the same position on the north wall, a memorial to the Rev. Edward Cullin (1776-1850), who built the church. HISTORICAL NOTE: Hallett based his design closely on the Catholic church of St Mary, Moorfields, London, completed by the architect John Newman between 1817 and 1820. In the late 1880s, designs for a complete remodelling of the church in a Romanesque/Italian Renaissance style were made by SJ Nicholl; these were shown at the Royal Academy in 1887 and published in ''The Builder'' for 21 May, 1887 and 1 September, 1888. (Pugh T: The Church of Saint John the Baptist, Brighton 1835-1985: Hove: 1985-: 11-36). |
| Hard archive file: | Yes |
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References
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Photographs
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