Artwork Data

Title

St.Michaël

Artist

Herman van Remmen

Year

1947

Material

natuursteen

Dimensions

h. 195 cm

Artwork Location

Address

Warmoezierstraat, Den Haag

City district

Centrum

GPS data

52.074802577541, 4.301646360852 View on map

Artwork Description

Text

It was the Roman Catholic Father Marijnen who had the Joannes de Deo Hospital built at Westeinde in 1873. He believed that the existing hospitals paid too little attention to the spiritual welfare of their patients. To be able to pay for the construction of the building, he went around the house himself. Decades later, the religious approach gradually disappeared. In 1969, the name was changed to Westeinde Hospital. Ten years later it moved to a new building on the Lijnbaan and since 1998 Westeinde Hospital has been part of the Medisch Centrum Haaglanden (MCH).

Two sculptures remind us of the Catholic character that the hospital originally had. One of them depicts the Archangel Michael. This sculpture was made in 1947 by Herman van Remmen. As the text on the sculpture shows, the monument serves to thank the archangel for protecting the hospital during the Second World War.

Michael was originally a guardian angel of the Hebrew people, later he was adopted by Christianity as a saint who fought against evil. This evil was usually represented as a dragon. Van Remmen portrays the archangel as a victor who restrains the dragon at his feet with the point of his sword.

Herman van Remmen, father of the well-known Hague sculptor Gerard van Remmen, was a religious man. As a member of the Society of R.C. Artists, he was commissioned by churches to make many sculptures with easily recognisable and slightly static figures. Exactly like his archangel in front of the hospital.

Originally, St Michael's was located near the old hospital. When the hospital moved to Lijnbaan in 1979, the statue was given a new place under the roof of the entrance. Later, it was moved to the rear. There it stands fraternally next to the statue of the Sacred Heart in a green strip in the car park.

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