Photo 1998"Architecture is a plant and the sculpture that ornaments it are its blossoms..."
John Storrs
John Storrs, born in Chicago in 1885, died 1956, was a long time collaborator of Louis Sullivan and Frank Lloyd Wright. A prolific sculptor and later a painter working in avant garde styles. As a student he had worked with Rodin. Work by Storrs is in the Art Institute of Chicago, the Whitney Museum (where a piece apparently once owned by Barry Byrne was featured in the recent American Century Exhibition) and in the Metropolitan and MOMA in New York.
The massive cast concrete statue of Christ the King was specially designed to fit the space Barry Byrne allocated between the doors.
Barry Byrne was a close friend of sculptor Alfonso Ianelli, another collaborator of Frank Lloyd Wright (Midway Gardens statuary) and worked on several church designs with him. Storrs was in Europe when this project took place and that may be the reason why he was used for the Cork project. Byrne seems to have known Storrs from about 1924. The basic shape of the piece was set out in the Byrne plans.
Photo 1998