Timeline

Key figures

Origin and history

The project of a diocesan museum of sacred art in Cambrai was first mentioned in October 1938 by Bishop Émile Deschrever, President of the Diocesan Commission of History and Sacred Art. The opening seems to occur just before or during World War II, although the exact location is not specified. Between 1939 and 1945, collections were protected at the Cambrai Museum of Fine Arts, some of which were evacuated to Brittany or central France. The official reopening took place in 1946 under the impetus of Bishop Chollet, Archbishop of Cambrai, with Abbé Cyrille Thelliez as the first curator.

In 1946, the museum moved to the former hall of the Revolutionary Court of the former Jesuit College. An association, the Society of Friends of Sacred Art, was founded in 1956 to support its mission: to safeguard liturgical and artistic objects in disinherence. On 18 May 1958, the museum was inaugurated in the former Jesuit church, becoming the first museum of religious art in France according to the speeches of the time. Its vocation is clearly defined: to preserve works threatened with abandonment or destruction.

Under the direction of Abbé Thelliez until his death in 1970, the museum organizes temporary exhibitions, such as the one on Notre-Dame de Grace de Cambrai (1971) or the churches of Marcoing Township before 1917. Father Félicien Machelart succeeded him and tried to keep an opening to the public twice a week in spring-summer. However, due to lack of financial resources, the museum closed permanently in 1975. The collections are then scattered between the archdiocese, the reserves of the Museum of Fine Arts and the Jesuit chapel.

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