Covering of Spire of Rouen Cathedral in France Catches Fire
A tarp and scaffolding covering the spire of a cathedral in Rouen, France, that inspired the artist Claude Monet caught fire on Thursday, city officials said.
The cathedral, Notre-Dame de Rouen, about 70 miles northwest of Paris, was evacuated, and several dozen firefighters sent in to extinguish the blaze, local officials said. They said in the early afternoon that the fire had been contained and that damage appeared to be minimal.
The cathedral, whose construction began in the 12th century, is considered to be one of the finest Gothic churches in France.
“It’s not just a historical landmark,” said Kathryn Calley Galitz, an art historian and educator at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York who specializes in European art. “It’s a living, breathing cathedral in the center of a very vibrant city.”
“It’s a marvel,” she added.
Monet painted the cathedral about 30 times in the early 1890s, according to the museum.
The blaze was a haunting reminder of the 2019 fire at Notre-Dame cathedral in Paris, which almost brought the building to the ground and toppled its 300-foot spire. The Paris cathedral, which is over 850 years old, is scheduled to reopen in December.
But in Thursday’s fire, “there doesn’t seem to be too much damage and, above all, no one was injured,” said Caroline Dutarte, a Rouen official.
She said that a tarp covering the cathedral’s spire during a period of renovation work had caught fire.
Jean-Benoît Albertini, the government representative in the area, said that emergency services had been called in to protect precious objects in the cathedral that could be affected by water runoff resulting from the firefighters’ efforts.
Stéphane Gouezec, the head of the local firefighting unit, told reporters in an afternoon news conference that the blaze was unlikely to spread beyond the wood scaffolding planks used by workers near the spire.
“We’re in the process of finishing putting out the fire,” he said.
The cause of the fire was unknown, the city’s mayor, Nicolas Mayer-Rossignol, said on social media shortly after the blaze broke out. “All of the public resources have been mobilized,” he added.
The cathedral has suffered significant harm in the past: An earlier building was destroyed by Viking invasions in 841, and the cathedral was severely damaged by Allied bombardments in World War II.
So has the spire, which, at almost 500 feet tall, is the highest in France. It was destroyed by lightning in 1822 and was later rebuilt using cast iron, then a very modern material.
One of the cathedral’s most notable visitors was Monet, who captured its facade from different angles and at different times of the day.
“He’s painting it over and over again in this focused way, trying to capture how these different conditions change its appearance,” Dr. Galitz said, adding, “It’s not the fleeting moment. He went back year after year to paint it.”
The celebrated structure also stands near where Joan of Arc was martyred in the 15th century.
“Rouen Cathedral, and Rouen, loom large in the imagination of the French,” said Fred S. Kleiner, a professor emeritus of the history of art and architecture at Boston University, “because of Monet, because of Joan of Arc, because of its ancient, ancient history as a Christian site.”
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