[HN Gopher] Notre Dame rises again
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Notre Dame rises again
Author : gibspaulding
Score : 145 points
Date : 2022-07-27 16:22 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.nationalgeographic.co.uk)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.nationalgeographic.co.uk)
| fritztastic wrote:
| Can the wood beams be seen in the cathedral? Do visitors ever
| tour the roof area? I'm trying to understand why it is so
| important to rebuild it exactly like the original, the benefits
| of this besides being faithful to the historical structure.
| Wouldn't it make more sense to innovate and make a new roof that
| would offer potential features to the cathedral?
|
| Anyway I thought this part was funny
|
| > "I see, monsieur, you have been contaminated by those who
| believe the president of the republic should not be interfering
| in the reconstruction of Notre Dame," he boomed. "You have been
| contaminated by the party of slowness." Georgelin is a good-
| humoured alpha type
|
| Sounds more like a condescending way to avoid addressing the
| topic to me, personally. But that's just my opinion.
| shlip wrote:
| Since the time that article was written, several problems have
| arised/surfaced concerning the restoration project (Le canard
| enchaine, June 26 2022, p.5): - Some of the wood
| used in the foundational carpentry work (tabouret) was found to
| not meet quality criteria ( not dry enough ). - An
| other lead sarcophagus was found on site in June. Georgelin
| refused to have archeologists extract and/or study it.
| - The stacked bungalows used as life quarters for workers do not
| meet the security criteria and part of them are therefore not
| allowed to be used.
|
| It should also be noted that Georgelin is willing to do anything
| in order to meet the 2024 deadline, even if it means botching all
| the work.
| Luc wrote:
| Any project this size will have to surmount much larger
| problems than that. Those sound like minor issues.
| xwolfi wrote:
| "botching all the work" and "not meeting french quality
| criteria" are so far away. Almost as laughable as quoting le
| Canard Enchaine as more than a tongue in cheek rumour mill.
| Reventlov wrote:
| Le Canard Enchaine is not a << tongue in cheek rumour mill
| >>, it has revealed many scandals in France (mainly
| political): https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_d%27affaires_
| r%C3%A9v%C3...
|
| Saying it's a rumour mill is wrong.
| cm2187 wrote:
| It has also revealed as many scandals that turned out to be
| pure libel. It is basically an anonymous postbox for
| journalists to publish papers that were turned down by
| their own editor.
| Fiahil wrote:
| > Some of the wood used in the foundational carpentry work
| (tabouret) was found to not meet quality criteria ( not dry
| enough ).
|
| I would love to see your article, because I think their
| journalist just doesn't understand how carpentry works :)
|
| In the case of Notre Dame, the works is _extremely_ difficult.
| We're talking about fitting a massive amount of Oak timber that
| used to came from 200-300 years old oak trees into a monument.
|
| Finding trees that are in good shape and -at least- old enough
| so they can be used whole for carpentry is difficult. Turning a
| tree into a single huge oak beam is difficult. Transporting a
| beam to Notre-Dame without damaging it is difficult. Assembling
| several beams together into a "ferme" is difficult. And, of
| course, carpentry is often done with same-age trees cut at the
| same time so they can age together in place and dry on site for
| tighter fit. Getting that repeated xn times is difficult.
|
| If the oak was "too green", that's not an issue, as long as the
| rest of the oak is also "too green". They will bend and crack,
| and that's usual for oak carpentry. It's literally the least of
| their issues.
|
| By the way, the original "forest" of Notre-Dame was built from
| oak trees that were transported onsite via the Seine. Trunks
| directly in water. So the wood was completely soaked when cut
| into place. It's something we don't do anymore, so the oak can
| be "not dry enough" as you want, it's still going to be dryer
| than the original.
| comboy wrote:
| How much is wood drying about getting rid of the water vs
| resin freezing (not sure if freezing is the proper word, I
| mean it getting hard)?
| Fiahil wrote:
| It's getting hard because the water goes away. It means the
| wood shrinks, warps and cracks as fibers get closer to one
| another.
|
| In the case of Oak, the wood is pretty dense already. The
| shrinkage stills happens, but less than green pine for
| example.
|
| Also, green Oak has some pliability to it and is much
| easier to work on than seasoned Oak. Carpenters will use
| green Oak as much as possible and let it finish to dry on
| site, so joins are perfectly held in place and the overall
| fit is tighter. Of course, proper craftsmanship would have
| built the right tolerances for wood drying up directly in
| the work piece. So, you know, I think the carpenters there
| have some experience.
|
| Using seasoned Oak - like what you would find in dead trees
| that are still standing - can be super unproductive. It is
| so hard that it will break your chainsaw / chisel if you're
| not careful and be otherwise full of pest / mushrooms.
|
| That's why I think the Canard Enchaine is trying to spread
| some shit, just because they like the smell.
|
| PS: you can find more about the process here :
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CO0PgfCZHtw (in french)
| organsnyder wrote:
| Using "green" wood in timber framing is quite common. The
| important thing, like you mention, is that it is all of
| similar dryness.
| hgazx wrote:
| vidoc wrote:
| telotortium wrote:
| Tl;Dr it's being rebuilt exactly as before (according to the 19th
| century Viollet-le-Duc restoration).
| RjQoLCOSwiIKfpm wrote:
| The pictured glass plate photos seem fake to me, i.e. they seem
| to be recent pictures which have been photoshoped to look like
| glass plates:
|
| If you go to the gallery you'll notice the 3rd picture contains
| some cables at the bottom.
|
| These cables seem to be attached to the building by a
| *transparent* piece of material.
|
| Which would be plastic I guess?
|
| And transparent plastic wouldn't have been used for attaching
| cables to buildings back then?
|
| It also says "Photograph by Tomas van Houtryve", and that person
| is still alive according to Google. If it really were glass
| plates he would probably be dead already?
| ganbatekudasai wrote:
| I am curious how you arrived to "fake" as conclusion where
| there is absolutely no sign _or_ reason for faking anything.
|
| I think that it is obvious, to casual observers as well, that
| this is a modern day photographer using vintage equipment. No
| need to resort to detective work to notice the obvious modern
| wiring (which is present in every picture except for one, the
| elephant), or that the author is still alive, when that
| information is just in the captions.
|
| And the reason why it's done is obvious, too: It's a great
| artistic choice that meshes well with the subject's aesthetic.
| ryanmercer wrote:
| >they seem to be recent pictures which have been photoshoped to
| look like glass plates:
|
| If you click Tomas's name and scroll down some you see on his
| profile "Photographer Tomas van Houtryve captured the 19th-
| century grotesques, or chimeras, with 19th-century equipment:
| under a dark cloak, on glass plates, with a wooden camera he
| picked up in a Paris antique shop."
|
| https://www.nationalgeographic.co.uk/photographer/tomas-van-...
|
| He's a modern Belgian documentary photographer using period
| equipment.
| RjQoLCOSwiIKfpm wrote:
| Thanks for figuring that out!
|
| Now further questions arise:
|
| Did he artificially age the glass plates?
|
| Because the damage of the photo layer at the edges would
| normally be due to aging?
|
| How would you even age them artificially like that?
|
| Also, where do you obtain fresh, unused glass plates
| nowadays? I have a suitable camera but no plates! :)
| ryanmercer wrote:
| I have no clue about the process but if I had to guess I
| imagine it has something to do with the chemicals not being
| evenly distributed either by inexperience, some sort of
| mask used before chemical exposure to achieve the effect,
| or the process is just prone to doing that.
| jonah wrote:
| The process is just prone to doing that.
|
| It's a combination of things - uneven application of the
| likely hand applied chemical coating, handling the plates
| by the edges while loading and processing, unevenness of
| the metal frame surrounding the plate in the camera,
| older lenses which had vignetting and lower sharpness at
| the edges, processing chemicals seeping into the edges of
| the coating, etc etc.
| jonah wrote:
| You can do an internet search for plates for your
| particular size or model of camera. They're probably out
| there.
| Palomides wrote:
| j lane dry plates
|
| https://www.pictoriographica.com/dry-plate-blog
| mvuijlst wrote:
| Short film here: https://vimeo.com/699756494?embedded=true&
| source=video_title...
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| jonah wrote:
| There are quite a few people shooting with vintage equipment
| and techniques. They do it for many reasons - for a specific
| aesthetic, to evoke a certain time period, to achieve technical
| qualities not readily doable with modern equipment, because
| it's fun to play with old tools, because there's a market for
| art using older techniques, etc.
|
| I have a friend who's business is producing images -
| portraiture and landscapes - on very large glass plates for
| example.
|
| http://lachambrephotographique.squarespace.com/
|
| I have another friend who is a high-end commercial photographer
| by day, but for his personal art, he shoots with large format
| view cameras - which would be using glass plate negatives - in
| this style of Ansel Adams or Edward Weston.
| bendbro wrote:
| Thank god they didn't pick one of those modern atrocities.
|
| And yes, before any speculate, I am unironically an out-of-the-
| closet bigot.
| pen2l wrote:
| I was fortunate enough to visit it the year before it caught on
| fire.
|
| It's just a cathedral, I thought, just an attraction to check off
| from my 'list of things to see' so I visited it on a whim really
| on a lazy Sunday afternoon while I was around the area. Oh man,
| there is something about it, the grandness, the structure. The
| rebuild appears to going for a very faithful reconstruction of
| what it was before.
|
| Definitely go see it if you get the chance.
| drewzero1 wrote:
| I was in Paris for only a day in 2015 and saw Notre Dame from
| the outside but did not have the time to wait in line. I fondly
| remember everything I was able to experience walking up and
| down the Seine that day, but a small part of me regrets being
| so close and not going in.
| mytailorisrich wrote:
| The interior of the "Sainte-Chapelle", which is nearby is even
| more breathtaking, IMHO. Both deserve a visit.
| cjaro wrote:
| La Sainte-Chapelle was far better than the Notre Dame for me.
| I went to mass at the cathedral but the art and design of the
| Saint-Chapelle was more beautiful to me. I grew up catholic
| so maybe huge grand cathedrals don't really inspire much
| beyond reluctance and memories of suffocating in stuffy
| cathedrals my whole childhhood.
|
| It is a beautiful piece of history, but that's the extent of
| it for me. Cheers to those to find the cathedral moving or
| breathtaking.
| anonAndOn wrote:
| They hold (held?) small, intimate classical concerts in the
| chapel infrequently during the summer which gave the audience
| a glimpse of what it must've been like to live like royalty.
| The experience was sublime.
| bloomingeek wrote:
| I totally get it. As a non-Catholic, I still fell in love with
| Notre Dame, my wife actually was so moved at our first glance
| she cried. You never forget a traveling experience like that!
| regentbowerbird wrote:
| And if you are in Paris and can't visit Notre-Dame because it
| is under renovation, maybe go see some other gothic cathedrals
| that are less than an hour away by train, such as Beauvais' or
| Chartres'.
|
| For what my opinion is worth, I was awestruck by Beauvais'
| cathedral personally (even though, or especially because, I
| visited a fair number of period churches). Its nave is
| incredibly high, high enough that the aisles vaults by
| themselves are higher than some entire churches. It's also only
| halfway done, which is somewhat disappointing from an
| architectural perspective but fascinating from an archeological
| perspective: half the Carolingian cathedral is still there,
| which is a rarity.
| kakwa_ wrote:
| Another beautiful cathedral around Paris is Amiens.
|
| It's a more recent cathedral than Notre-Dame, and
| consequently higher, nearly as high as Beauvais in fact, but
| this one didn't collapse (even if she needed a very costly
| iron belt to stay that way).
|
| It's also located near the quite nice Saint Leu neighborhood
| with tons of restaurants near the main canal. And right next
| to Saint Leu, you have the Hortillonnages (crisscross of
| waterways and small gardens) which are also worth a visit
| (it's possible to rent boats to visit them).
|
| It's only ~1 hour away from Paris (Gare du Nord) by train,
| and definitely worth spending a day there in my opinion. Just
| don't be afraid by the sight of the tour Perret when exiting
| the station at Amiens ^^.
| rmason wrote:
| I've had people tell me it's just a church. Course they've
| never visited. I was there for the first time in 1975. It took
| my breath away, there's definitely something spiritual you feel
| to your core. I felt extreme joy, awe and happiness.
|
| The only other time that I've been such moved is when I visited
| Dachau. But it's a different feeling one of darkness and
| extreme sadness.
|
| Both are worth visiting to experience the true arc of human
| experience.
| SECProto wrote:
| I visited and while I found the scale somewhat awe-ing, it
| didn't have nearly as much an impact on me as you've
| described. What did have such an impact, however, was La
| Sagrada Familia
| spawarotti wrote:
| https://archive.ph/V9ALy
| 1337shadow wrote:
| Nice little story about how the people burnt Notre Dame a couple
| centuries ago. This makes me think about how Notre Dame has been
| rising for a millennium, how are we supposed to believe it "took
| fire" exactly? Cause the article is clear: last time it burnt
| like that it was because people did it on purpose. Do you think
| whoever did this has been forgiven, or "is yet to be found"?
| justinator wrote:
| A wonderful article. As a lover of art history, Notre Dame is an
| interesting example of European living art. As a former Catholic
| now atheist, I just don't know exactly how I feel about it's
| symbolism.
|
| I never had doubt that the cathedral would be rebuilt, though. A
| few years to rebuild is merely a wink in the time it took to,
| "finish" it.
| VHRanger wrote:
| You can enjoy the architecture and art (Notre Dame) without
| necessarily endorsing the artist (the church institution).
| Other examples:
|
| - Roman Polanski is a bad human who made good movies
|
| - The Pyramids of Egypt are grand structures but accomplished
| with slave labor
|
| etc. etc.
| justinator wrote:
| I... know.
|
| Although your examples are pretty bad. Roman Polanski is
| still alive, lives within the same legal boundaries of my
| world and should face the same repercussions for crimes. I
| may elect to not watch his films in favor of another artist
| as I certainly do not condone his behavior.
|
| A historical church from the Middle Ages built by generations
| of anonymous builders - maybe a different situation.
| jakear wrote:
| Slaves didn't build the pyramids:
|
| > Animal bones found at the village show that the workers
| were getting the best cuts of meat. More than anything, there
| were bread jars, hundreds and thousands of them - enough to
| feed all the workers, who slept in long, purpose-built
| dormitories. Slaves would never have been treated this well,
| so we think that these labourers were recruited from farms,
| perhaps from a region much further down the Nile, near Luxor.
|
| https://www.sciencefocus.com/science/were-the-egyptian-
| pyram...
| jacquesm wrote:
| The church institution is not the artist, they were the
| artists' sponsor and commissioned the work.
| trasz wrote:
| Sure, but in this case this could be easily avoided by
| turning it into something useful to society, eg a museum.
| virtualritz wrote:
| Not disagreeing with your point. However:
|
| > The Pyramids of Egypt are grand structures but accomplished
| with slave labor
|
| That theory is not well supported any more as of ca. 2010.[1]
|
| [1] see Construction/Workforce in
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Pyramid_of_Giza
| akharris wrote:
| There's a wonderful interview with the photographer for this
| piece, Tomas van Houtryve, on Leica's blog: https://leica-
| camera.blog/2022/05/09/rebuilding-notre-dame/.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Those photos are really beautiful.
| cb7 wrote:
| chki wrote:
| Just to make this clear to everybody: there are no signs at all
| that this fire was arson. There are multiple explanations for
| the cause of the fire involving the construction site and some
| sort of negligence, which seem highly likely to be true.
| seszett wrote:
| And the "wave" was a handful of unrelated fires that happened
| near churches (not even in churches for most of them) over a
| few years and were mounted as a "wave of arson" by extreme-
| right websites during the height of Syrian refugees influx.
|
| The original website that had a map of these events (that you
| had to look up yourself to see they amounted to nothing)
| isn't even online anymore as far as I can see, now this false
| fact is just a urban legend with a life of its own.
| namecheapTA wrote:
| galgot wrote:
| I've seen news of churches (Catholic, as most Churches are
| in France) been set on fire maybe 2 or 3 times in the news
| here in France, that was a while ago... Not seen any news
| like that recently. Are there any sources about the true
| numbers of these arson fires ?
|
| I had the same conversation with someone living in the US
| at the time of the Notre-Dame fire, I couldn't come with
| more than 2 or 3 occurrences reported in the French press
| naming specifics cases with places names and all, while he,
| in the US would provide me with dozen of press reports of
| "Churches are burnings by numbers in France !" type of
| titles ... Many from a very specific side of the political
| spectrum.
| User23 wrote:
| Also the ashes weren't even cold, heck the fire was still
| burning, when the prestige media that serves as most
| people's sole epistemological authority pronounced that the
| fire was absolutely assuredly accidental.
|
| I recall being particularly impressed with the speed and
| rigor of that investigation.
| selimthegrim wrote:
| Do you have even the tiniest shred of circumstantial evidence
| this was intentional?
| googlryas wrote:
| Besides for lack of evidence of arson and evidence of negligent
| construction practices, how exactly do you guess one could root
| out anti-church extremists?
| dreen wrote:
| Rebuilding "as it was", despite calls for modernization, is also
| something that happened after the Great Fire of London in 1666.
| Especially Christopher Wren, one of the most famous architects of
| XVII century, was supposedly very upset that his plan for a
| concentric ring-like city plan was rejected, in favour of
| rebuilding the city with all its tangled medieval street plan.
| owoskdhrkr wrote:
| Details: https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/jan/25/how-
| london-mi...
|
| I don't think Wren's plan looks very concentric or ring-like.
| He also got to rebuild St. Paul's to a completely new design,
| in those years. Maintaining the original plot boundaries, as
| the city was rebuilt, naturally didn't interfere with the
| cathedral.
| dreen wrote:
| Thanks, never saw the plan just heard an anecdote. And it's
| interesting to learn London landlords could be as "assertive"
| in XVII century as they are now
| [deleted]
| bombela wrote:
| This website is cancer. Randomly switch to a different article.
| And hijack the history in a loop.
| pwg wrote:
| Using Ublock Origin to block all the javascript allows the
| article to be read, without random switches or history
| hijacking.
| euroclydon wrote:
| I never knew what a flying buttress was. They sure are ugly.
| Makes the building look like a group of giant spiders.
| giraffe_lady wrote:
| Funny enough I think this was the common view when they were
| introduced as well. They were a necessary kludge to get certain
| interior features and through age and context they've become
| appreciated for their own sake.
| VHRanger wrote:
| They were necessary back then to keep an open space interior.
| With modern building techniques they're obviously not
| necessary.
|
| That said, most people love them
| throw0101a wrote:
| Meta: What structures built today will be thought
| important/sacred/useful enough to be kept around for several
| hundred years?
|
| * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Notre-Dame_de_Paris
| bobthepanda wrote:
| A lot of modern buildings are rebar, and in practice rebar
| seems to have a lifespan of around 100 years.
| Barrin92 wrote:
| Due do usefulness maybe a few very significant pieces of
| infrastructure, but I don't there's such a thing as a new
| sacred structure because there's nothing that is sacred,
| period. An interesting observation is that artefacts which were
| moved from their places of origin (which are still sacred) in
| the ME to say museums as an explicit act of modern
| conservation, these were the first artefacts to be destroyed
| during the recent wars in the region, while anything still
| stuck in its 'unsafe' places has survived. The defining feature
| of modernity is that everything is replaceable.
| mongol wrote:
| Pentagon.
| wongarsu wrote:
| Notre Dame took about a century to complete, keeping it around
| for at least ten times its construction time isn't crazy
| compared to other structures.
|
| In that vein, the Sagrada Familia [1] might get finished this
| decade, was started in 1883, and is likely to be kept around
| for a couple centuries.
|
| [1] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sagrada_Fam%C3%ADlia
| rob74 wrote:
| The Sagrada Familia was my first thought too. Definitely
| worth a visit! I think it very much carries on the spirit of
| Gothic cathedrals. Those builders used the best construction
| techniques of their time to create breathtaking buildings,
| and Gaudi did the same with the techniques of his time (and
| those who picked up the work after he died did the same). The
| interior with the tree-like branching columns is especially
| impressive...
| wongarsu wrote:
| Technically an extension of a much older building, but I think
| the glass pyramid of the Louvre in Paris, completed in 1988, is
| iconic enough that we will want to keep it around. It's also
| easy and practical to maintain compared to other structures we
| value.
| peterpost2 wrote:
| First one that comes to my mind is the Chernobyl sacrophage.
| GloriousKoji wrote:
| The ones that brings in all the tourists and money?
| ganbatekudasai wrote:
| Right. The question being discussed is which ones that will
| be.
| kakwa_ wrote:
| Well, that's only a recent development (compared to the life
| span of these historical buildings).
|
| A lot of these Cathedrals managed to survive long period of
| neglect with minimal to no maintenance.
|
| There is a bit of survivor bias in there, but it's also a
| testament to the durability of these buildings.
| blocked_again wrote:
| Best guess would be the same structures that have been kept
| around us by over the past hundred years for their importance,
| scarcity and usefulness.
|
| Some of them being Great Wall of China, Taj Mahal, Machu Pichu,
| Petra, etc.
| munk-a wrote:
| Probably buildings that gain historical significance - that's a
| very hard thing to predict but I'd guess the next important
| site is probably going to be where Ukraine and Russia sign a
| treat to cease violence - assuming that happens and that it
| happens on Ukrainian soil.
| bobthepanda wrote:
| Yes and no.
|
| Some sites of historical significance were intentionally
| destroyed, particularly if the memory is painful. Most
| notably it has been very hard to preserve what remains of the
| Berlin Wall as a memorial.
| squirtle24 wrote:
| They built a modern day replica of the Leaning Tower of Pisa in
| downtown SF [1]. If the original is anything to go by, this one
| should last 600 years!
|
| [1]
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennium_Tower_(San_Francisc...
| avemg wrote:
| We'll never know. That's for future generations to decide!
| eCa wrote:
| I doubt any of the all-window-facade building will be able to
| stand the test of time. On the other hand, the parisians wanted
| the "useless and monstrous" Eiffel tower torned down after the
| exhibition (as was the plan) so I think it is inherently
| difficult to guess.
| em-bee wrote:
| maybe some of these:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wonders_of_the_World#Seven_Won...
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_7_Wonders_of_the_World
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bah%C3%A1%CA%BC%C3%AD_House_of...
| rdl wrote:
| Big dams and bridges would get my vote (Hoover, Aswan, etc.)
|
| Possibly launch facilities at Cape Canaveral and Boca Chica.
| BurningFrog wrote:
| Every single shed, gas station, and park bench in San
| Francisco, for starters.
| fmajid wrote:
| Don't forget the historic laundromats!
| arthurcolle wrote:
| Any bets on what cursed specimen is inside the lead sarcophagus?
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