MEMORIAL WINDOW

Evening Post, Volume CXXV, Issue 71, 25 March 1938, Page 4

MEMORIAL WINDOW

CANTERBURY COLLEGE

WORK NEARING COMPLETION!

(From "The Post's" Representative.) "I

LONDON, March 2. '

The Great "War memorial window ex« ecuted by Mr. Martin Travers, the prominent English stained glass designer, for the hall of Canterbury College is now nearly completed. Work is proqeeding in London on the final sections, and itis expected that .the entire win.dow will -be shippedfabout April 6. It is hoped to exhibit it in London before shipment.

The window has taken several years to make. The design was evolved by Mr. Travers in collaboration.with the Canterbury College authorities and has undergone a number -of modifications since first planned. f " It is difficult to form "an adequate impression of the work^at the present s+age as no substantial' part of the window is assembled. When completed, the window will have'■five lights, each, surmounted by a small circular light. The theme is carried acr6ss from one light to the next, so that the effect will be that of one huge window. The highest light is. 22ft, long, ...and the height to the top of the central circular light will be 25ft. The design is most striking. At the base a group of soldiers, including New Zealandersi are 'seert repelling dragons, representing brutality and ignorance. Mounting above this on a pathway round a rocky crag are figures of men and women famous irt history for service by action and thought*

In the first category come-CUve^Law-rence, Alfred the Qreati:Hi,chard'l;'NeU son, Wellington^ Drake, % and 's whose actions relate"-..t0 and Pitt, Henry VI, Elizabeth■•PryV* Edward Gibbon Wakefield, Captain Scott, and Captain Cook, in the.sphere of action in peace; \''''■'■'.\\'V;i:~~?, Of those representing service- by thought, William Wycombe, Shakespeare, Chaucer, Ca'xton,' Wren, Purcell, and Sir. Joshua Eeynolds are grouped one the side of art,; and Bacon, Dr. Harvey, Darwin, Newton, Faraday, and Watt the sciences. Also on the pathway of those rendering service are Florence Nightingale—a nurse assisting a wounded soldier—a New Zealand Digger, and Selwyn teaching the faith to a Maori.

Above the human figures are others representing the qualities of action, justice, truth,' and thought..;•; Humanity, sits at the top "of the. crag, and above her, * representing rises a spire which1' disappears from view in the highest window. The arms of New Zealand and-Canterbury appear in two of the small (circular lights. . • '■ ' ■:■;■;■ There is already an example of Mr. Travers's work in New Zealand. It is a memorial' window at Christ's College to the Key. G. S. Bryan-Brown.