ABSTRACT
Philippe Liébert et le tabernacle du maitre-autel
de 1'Hopital-General des Soeurs Grises
Cécile Langlois-Szaszkiewicz
1985
Philippe Liébert (1733-1804) came to New France with some
1400 soldiers in 1755. The English Conquest of Quebec and Montreal in 1759-1760 put an end
temporarily to his military career and he became totally involved in decorating Catholic
churches and making tabernacles in Canada. In 1775, the invasion of Canada by the
Americans interrupted his career as a sculptor. Out of French patriotism he joined Moïse
Hazen’s Canadian Regiment in the U.S. Army in 1776, no doubt hoping for a return to
French rule in Canada or at least a state of freedom and liberty from the English military
occupation. After ten years, he returned to Quebec to do what he did best. Once more his
name began to appear in the receipt books of the Montreal and region parishes. His first
major tabernacle was made for the Grey Nuns at the Hôpital-Général in Old Montreal. It
served as the model for a prolific production of tabernacles displaying a variety of
decorative styles unlike any other in Lower Canada. His contemporaries, commissioned to
copy the design and ornaments of this tabernacle, were not able to achieve the excellence
of the masterpiece created by Philippe Liébert.
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