The Church of St. Andreas was constructed between 1622 and 1629 in the South German baroque style. It was originally a Jesuit church and also served as the court church for the Counts palatine of Neuburg. After the dissolution of the Jesuit order in August 1773 it served as a parish church until 2005 when it became the monastery church of the Dominican Order. The building itself is now owned by the city of Düsseldorf.
The church is furnished with stucco by Johannes Kuhn from Strassburg and life-size sculptures of the apostles and of saints of the Society of Jesus.
In the late 17th and early 18th centuries, the church was an important center of musical culture in Düsseldorf. The composer Johann Hugo von Wilderer served as its organist. The mausoleum, designed by Venetian architect Simone del Sarto, contains the tombs of several Electors Palatine, including that of Johann Wilhelm. The high altar of the church was destroyed during World War II. The new altar, designed by Ewald Mataré was built in 1960. Paintings by Ernst Deger can be found in the church's two side altars which are dedicated to the Virgin Mary.
References:The Pilgrimage Church of Wies (Wieskirche) is an oval rococo church, designed in the late 1740s by Dominikus Zimmermann. It is located in the foothills of the Alps in the municipality of Steingaden.
The sanctuary of Wies is a pilgrimage church extraordinarily well-preserved in the beautiful setting of an Alpine valley, and is a perfect masterpiece of Rococo art and creative genius, as well as an exceptional testimony to a civilization that has disappeared.
The hamlet of Wies, in 1738, is said to have been the setting of a miracle in which tears were seen on a simple wooden figure of Christ mounted on a column that was no longer venerated by the Premonstratensian monks of the Abbey. A wooden chapel constructed in the fields housed the miraculous statue for some time. However, pilgrims from Germany, Austria, Bohemia, and even Italy became so numerous that the Abbot of the Premonstratensians of Steingaden decided to construct a splendid sanctuary.