Pfarrkirche Unsere Liebe Frau, Zedlitzdorf, Roman Catholic parish church in Zedlitzdorf, Austria
Pfarrkirche Unsere Liebe Frau is a Roman Catholic church in Zedlitzdorf, part of a nearly square two-storey complex with a cross-vaulted cloister around a square courtyard. The higher nave adjoins a lower, recessed, half-round choir; above its east front stands a low bell tower with round-arched sound windows and a curved pyramid roof. All roofs are covered with wooden shingles.
A Trinity chapel existed here from 1600 and burned down in 1754. Under Maria Theresa a Carmelite hospice was founded to missionise the strongly Protestant area, and the church was consecrated in 1768. The monastery was dissolved in 1787, after which the church became a curate. The hospice complex is now privately owned and rented to tourists.
The church is dedicated to Our Lady, but the 1768 consecration followed the founding of a Carmelite hospice under Maria Theresia to missionise the strongly Protestant area. The triumphal arch bears painted chronograms naming the empress and the Klagenfurt estates as patrons, and the choir murals show Maria Theresia with foreign peoples behind a balustrade.
The church stands in Zedlitzdorf, part of the Feldkirchen in Kärnten municipality; the former Carmelite hospice adjoining it is privately owned and rented to tourists, so the church and courtyard are best viewed from the outside unless a service is underway. The complex forms an almost square two-storey block around a square inner courtyard, with the church on its north front.
The rococo wall paintings from the third quarter of the 18th century include chronograms on the triumphal arch: the left inscription names Maria Theresia as empress and Archduchess of Carinthia and gives 1754, the right one credits the Klagenfurt royal council with the renovation of 1760. In the choir, painted figures of foreign peoples stand behind a balustrade with Maria Theresia, depicting the Carmelites' missionary work and the continents.
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