100,000. 100,000 people have already signed, in exactly ten days, the petition we launched on 10 December at 2.30pm against the replacement of Viollet-le-Duc’s stained glass windows in Notre-Dame. This is obviously not - just read the accompanying text and the articles we have already published on this subject - a petition against contemporary stained glass windows in old churches. It is certainly more convenient to attack us on what we have never said (we even claim the opposite) than to debate the real reasons why we are fighting against the iniquitous decision of the President of the Republic, supported by the Archbishop of Paris: we are in favour of preserving the nineteenth-century additions at Notre-Dame de Paris because they have great heritage value, because they withstood the fire and have even been restored, because they form part of a coherent architectural whole and, and finally, for those who would be put off by these obvious facts, because they are protected by a historic monument classification, which implies, according to the law, their "conservation [because they] represent, from the point of view of history or art, a public interest". Since when is the law optional?
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- 1. Alfred Gérente (1821-1868)
Under the direction of Eugène-Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc (1814-1869)
Stained glass window from the Saint-Eloi chapel, 1865
(first chapel of the right aisle)
Threatened with being removed and replaced by a contemporary stained glass window
Photo: Janericloebe (Public domain) - See the image in its page
100 000 people in ten days is an enormous number for a petition on heritage conservation. It demonstrates once again that Notre-Dame is not a monument like any other, and that preserving it as it was before the fire is an almost unanimous demand. The result has been an unprecedented mobilisation of resources, raising €850 million to restore it. To restore it, not to transform it. The donors did not want contemporary stained glass windows to replace the existing ones, and we must respect their wishes. Our goal was more modest: if we’d managed to get 50,000 people to sign up after just one month, that would already have been remarkable and very significant. 100,000 signatories in ten days, a figure that continues to rise, should give pause for thought to the promoters of this project, first and foremost the President of the Republic, since the Ministry of Culture is clearly out of the picture.
In the first half of January, because we have to move quickly - the Head of State’s objective is to install these stained glass windows by the time the cathedral reopens in a year’s time - we will be presenting the petition and the list of signatories to the Élysée Palace. Although the 100 000 mark has already been passed, the rate of progress is much slower than it was. Our objective was more modest, but it’s clear that we can still go much higher. It’s important for everyone to promote this action to their family, friends, professional contacts and via social networks. We need to spread the word about the petition and encourage other people to sign. It is also essential for the petition to be relayed abroad. For the moment, the petitioners are mainly in France. The emotion at the time of the fire was worldwide, and it will also be worldwide for the threats now hanging over these stained glass windows. We have already been interviewed by one of South Korea’s leading television channels, which shows that everyone is concerned.
Please let us know if you have any ideas on how we can make the petition truly international. We are working on this with our American, British and European friends. We are contacting heritage protection associations abroad to ask them to help us in this process. But here again, everyone can take action. 100,000 people is great, but we can do even more, all together. All together, let’s protect Notre-Dame from the vandalism that threatens it.