Par Amélie Loho
Published on Jan 9, 24 at 5:00 p.m. See my news Follow Le Ploërmelais
In the assembly of wishes in Malestroit (Morbihan), Lionel Burgun. If his face is not familiar, the thousand-year-old city owes him a lot. He is the man who found traces of the stained glass windows of the Madeleine chapel. The very ones who had disappeared for 120 years. An “incredible” story according to the mayor, Bruno Gicquello.
Found on Instagram
After adorning the religious building, they were sold in the second half of the 19th century to a Norman antique dealer. In 1889, the famous French writer, Émile Zola, acquired these Renaissance gems to place them in front of him in his writing office in Médan, in Yvelines.
When he died in 1903, the stained glass windows were sold to an American businessman. Without anyone really knowing what had become of them.
It was Lionel Burgun’s “curiosity and detective spirit” that made it possible to find them… on the other side of the Atlantic. “I recognized them on the Instagram account of Saint David’s school, a private school in New York,” shares the tour guide at Maison Zola – Dreyfus Museum.
While browsing the internet, I came across a book that lists all the stained glass windows sold in the United States at the beginning of the 20th century. That’s where I first spotted them, in a photo of their chapel.
Lionel Burgun
Two stained glass windows are still missing
The Yvelinois was decorated with the City’s numbered millennium medal for “his exceptional contribution” to the history of Malestroit’s heritage.
It now remains to be seen whether he will succeed in unraveling the last mystery… Because two stained glass windows are still missing. Only ten of the twelve works of art are in America. The quest is on.
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2024-01-09 16:00:48
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