A papal palace in Jerusalem

The idea of such a project is enough to get each and every hair on each and every conspiracy theorist's head to stand on end. But, apparently, someone in the early 20th Century did not think the project entirely too far-fetched. Glancing through my copy of The Master Drawings of Otto Wagner the other day, on an entirely different errand, I discovered these beguiling watercolors. The proposal was authored in 1912 by Josef Heinisch, an Austrian architect who was very much a devotee of the Jugendstil, as was Wagner. Further commentary and background information are not provided.

I suspect that this was simply a student project, rather than any sort of official proposal sanctioned by the Holy See. However, at that time Pope Pius X was on the Chair of Peter and the papacy was still essentially a "prisoner of the Vatican". Relations with the Kingdom of Italy were chilly at best, and there was some talk throughout the years previous of the papacy moving. The Ottomans, who controlled the Middle East at the time, were not favorably disposed toward Italy, a stance which could have theoretically engendered an alliance with the popes. In any event, there was enough back story to make this pass muster as a decent theoretical project for a student to undertake.

An aerial view of the complex

The plan, as a whole, resembles that of one of the great French Gothic cathedrals

The elevation. Note the inscription. Rather interesting considering our current Jesuit Pontiff.

Section through the church.

Small Parish Church

Last week I was privileged to hear a lecture by Mr. Jim Leggitt, an architect and architectural illustrator who is the author of a book, Drawing Shortcuts, that was one of my constant companions in studio my freshman year. Mr. Leggitt discoursed at length on how modern technologies and hand drawing techniques can be fused harmoniously to create a pleasing result in less time - an important consideration in these times of shrinking building budgets and shrunken firms. This weekend, I used one of the techniques Mr. Leggitt discussed to develop the drawing below. I began with a simple, monochrome SketchUp model. I exported and printed the view from that model. I then added several layers of colored pencil, rescanned the image and then altered it slightly in Photoshop.

The subject matter is a small parish church in a style that attempts to hearken back to the days of the Church's infancy in the Near East. There is something I delight in when I see materials that are visibly strong in some way. I have explored this concept many times over in my various projects in the studio, but I push it into a more traditional idiom here. The arches are massive and they rest on immense piers. The gilded and painted wood beams give a heaviness to the ceiling. The small clerestory windows pierce the thick, rammed earth wall.

We often think of a church's architecture lifting the mind to the things of heaven, but in this example, I have attempted to marry the things of heaven with the things of earth. The sanctuary is traditionally arranged, but the altar is located in a particularly cave-like apse. This was often the case in the early Christian basilicas. But, more than mere architectural precedent, this decision reflects the mystical meaning of the cave in Christian belief. The central act of our redemption - the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ - centers on burial within a rock-hewn tomb. Additionally, we can recall the early Christians worshiping in the catacombs at the martyrs' tombs.

Yet, though the apse is exaggeratedly small, it is the most resplendently decorated portion of the church. A richly ornamented altar (itself often mystically related to the tomb of Christ - His altar of sacrifice) sits in front of a gilded icon of the Holy Trinity, flanked by two angels bearing incense. This arrangement recalls the Ark of the Covenant and the "mercy seat", whose nature has been revealed to us by Jesus.

Though it is perhaps not as visible at this scale, the decorative elements in the nave and the sanctuary are embellished with vines and other plants. This not only evokes Christ as the True Vine encompassing his Body gathered, but it also recalls the garden - the garden of Eden where we lost God's friendship, the garden where Christ's tomb was located where we are given a chance to regain God's friendship, and the garden of the new creation when all things will be restored in Christ.

A note about the chandeliers: I am of the opinion that many churches nowadays are simply dreadfully over lit (and over sound-systemed). If you light everything equally, nothing is emphasized and you lose the dramatic interplay of light and shadow that so often enlivens a space. The hanging lights are of a design common among the Eastern churches, which would provide ample light to the nave and sanctuary for evening services. I think the apse would have some discreet lighting tucked under the arch someplace, but I also like the thought of the soft light of the six altar candles glinting off the gold mosaic.

Something vaguely Byzantine

A little sketch project of the interior of a somewhat Byzantine or Romanesque church. I tend to use the terms interchangeably, as they refer to basically the same architectural movements in the Western and Eastern Roman Empire, respectively. Of course, there are distinctions to be made. As a rule, Byzantine architecture has a deeper focus on the surface and its ornamentation, while Romanesque tends to be focused on massing of architectural elements. The two can form interesting hybrids, though, with Byzantine surface treatments (mosaic, etc.) grafted onto a Romanesque body. And, that's basically what I attempted here.

A few notes are in order. The ceiling is heavy timber and the walls are stone - preferably of the warm, sandy color often found in Romanesque construction, especially in Germany. The nave is rather undecorated, save for a mosaic frieze that runs around the top of the walls, and the windows, which would be stained glass. The sanctuary is dealt with in a detail drawing below.

The sanctuary of any church should be the most rigorously thought-out in terms of iconography and graphic organization. It is the meeting place of heaven and earth during the liturgy, and its artistic scheme should reflect this nexus. In this particular design, I have divided the iconography among three vertical zones.

The first zone is from the vaulted ceiling to the tops of the windows. This zone represents heaven, and is centered on a mosaic image of Christ in Majesty, surrounded by seraphim. The panels to the left and right depict the Twelve apostles, gathered around the heavenly throne. The floral patterns to the far right and left recall the perfection of creation and the restoration of Eden in the New Jerusalem.

The second zone is that of the windows, which represent God's dealings in human history, through the person of Jesus Christ. Windows depicting the Nativity, the Transfiguration, the Crucifixion, the Resurrection, and Pentecost show the working of God throughout the timeline of our earth. The bottom third of the middle three windows is taken up by a depiction of the Last Supper, which graphically connects the image of the Crucifixion with the altar below.

The altar is the focal point of the third zone: that of God's continuing work in the life of humanity. The central crucifix and tabernacle recall the throne of God depicted above, while the gathering of priests and other ministers around the altar recalls the gathering of the Apostles to the throne of Christ. The altar itself is a fairly straightforward model that recalls many of the altars built in this country in the period between 1870 and 1910 or so.

These three zones work organically in the context of the liturgy. The mass, an event taking place at the altar in real time, re-presents the historic sacrifice of the Cross depicted in the central window, and reminds us of the glory of heaven that we are journeying toward.

Churches are theology in stone, and we should strive to have them reflect the divine order of creation instituted by God. We should not make churches mute buildings that we fill with our own meaning. Neither should we be superficial about the way we decorate or adorn our churches. The church building should be a gesamtkunstwerk, a total work of art, where all things within drive home a unified message.

Some Gothic Revival Thoughts

Last night I was struck with what I call an "art attack" - ideas that have been germinating for a while simply needed to be let onto the paper. The result was a facade of a Gothic Revival church. This facade design takes in a number of influences, chiefly the civil and ecclesiastical architecture of Bertram Goodhue, the Craftsman aesthetic of early 20th Century America, and King's College Chapel at Cambridge University. Oh, and perhaps a bit of Art Deco snuck in on the sidelines.

In composition, this facade hearkens back to Goodhue's noble and austere design of the Rockefeller Chapel at the University of Chicago. There are two small towers that flank a large, gabled, central mass pierced by an immense window. Twin portals finish out the bottom of the picture. In detail, however, the more - how shall I say - American aesthetic comes into play. Preference for straight lines, right angles, and clarity is established in the overall decorative scheme. This preference was perhaps best elucidated by the well-known works of Frank Lloyd Wright.

The overarching decorative scheme centers on the person of Christ in various ways. The twin portals are divided by a stylized stone depiction of the crucifixion. Below the crucifixion scene are the symbols of the Four Evangelists over the door frames - symbolic of the Church's mission to take Christ out into the world and evangelize. Above the portals is the large western window. This window would likely depict scenes from the life of the Virgin Mary - a lens through which we can view the way to Christ more clearly. The small towers are crowned with twin angels, each holding a shield depicting a Christological symbol (the cross, the Chi-Rho, the Alpha and Omega, and the Lamb). Crowning the entire facade is the Resurrected Christ in glory (similar, perhaps, to the great statue of the Cristo Redentor that crowns Rio de Janeiro). The angels on either side bow down, bearing the instruments of the Passion.

Driving this particular mental exercise was a desire to attempt to develop an American style for church building. I am indeed enthused with the contemporary drive toward a more traditional ecclesiastical design ethos, but sometimes these projects can seem slightly imported, or foreign, in a way. I think this is because some traditional designers tend to interpret tradition to simply mean "anything from the Italian Renaissance" or "anything Gothic" instead of perhaps its more authentic definition of "building on our shared past." This is why I attempted to draw so many architectural allusions to American movements - we need to build on our shared architectural heritage as a nation, while not disregarding the architectural traditions of our mother, the Church, and our teacher, Western civilization.

Please click the image to view larger, so that the detail can be better viewed.

Visibilium Omnium et Invisibilium

This is a drawing I did for the 37th Annual KRob Architectural Delineation Competition, which I was encouraged to enter by one of my professors. The subject matter is a sort of abstract hall of Gothic pillars and vaults. Light emanates from somewhere in the distance, casting strange shadows on the floor. It's a bit surrealist, and detail is deliberately avoided. This is not a real place.

The title, I think reveals a bit more about the work. I chose the phrase "Visibilium Omnium et Invisibilium" as the title of the piece. This phrase comes from the Nicene Creed and is translated as "All things, visible and invisible" (or, as it is currently rendered in the mass, "All that is seen and unseen"). The title adds another layer of surrealism, given the implied infinity of the view. The viewer is meant to feel that this huge hall could encompass all that is visible and invisible. Perhaps it's a portrait of the universe.

It will get a bit of touch-up before I send it off to the competition to be judged. Let me know what you think!

House in My Head

 We've been apart too long, O Blog Readers! Recently, I have been inordinately busy with the culmination of my first studio project of the semester. Now that everything has been completed, presented, and turned in, things are a great deal quieter on this side of the screen. That said, I thought I'd discuss my studio project in general and give you a feel of what I learned et cetera, et cetera.

The title of the project was The House in My Head, giving one a clue as to its residential nature. The crucible of the project was that we were to design and give life to a house that our client had in their head. Now, our clients were other members of our studio section. So, in essence, each person was both a client and an architect during this project: we shaped someone else's house while giving another person direction on where to take our own house. It was a very insightful project in that it allowed a first-hand experience with the client-architect relationship.

In order to make this project more successful, we, as clients, were not allowed to simply dictate to our architects the number of bedrooms we wanted, or what we wanted our kitchen to look like. On the contrary, we had to express to our architect the overall feeling and experiences of dwelling that we want our house to embody. This was achieved through a series of preliminary experiential exercises such as narrative writing, collage, and conceptual models.

From this idealistic level of feelings, it was the architect's challenge to translate them into concrete elements of living. But, we were consistently challenged to not think in terms of conventional house "parts" but in terms of what we need to accommodate in the client's everyday life. To that end, perspective drawings and models took center stage in the requirements of the project - as these are the easiest means of placing yourself into created spaces.

My client wished to live in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains overlooking Denver. His original narrative and illustrative collage conveyed feelings of intrigue, overlapping, folding, and pushing the boundary between landscape and building. To that end, I developed a house that folds along the crest of the ridge along the main datum of a very thick stone wall. This stone wall is the device that weaves throughout the home, creating spaces as it interacts with other planes throughout.

The house is not enormous, as the client wished to maintain a tight-knit sense of familiarity throughout the house. However, it is zoned in a way that makes each portion of the house seem distinct from the others: there are two sleeping zones that bookend the house, and in the middle are a dining/kitchen zone and a more private family gathering zone. Thinking in terms of zones rather than rooms can help guide the design more forcefully - putting together four large puzzle pieces is much easier than putting together seventeen small puzzle pieces.

In the end, I thought this project was very rewarding. My client agreed that this was a successful visualization of the house in his head. As an aside, my project, and a few other selected projects of my colleagues, will be on display at The Artist Within in downtown Muncie during the Art Walk this Thursday evening.

Design for a Bunk-house

Many of my readers will know that my extended family owns a small cabin in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. Purchased almost forty years ago by my grandfather and two great-uncles, it was originally intended to be strictly a hunting camp - as it sits on eighty acres of woodland. However, though it is still used for hunting during that season, nowadays the family enjoys going up there to really get away from it all and enjoy tearing around nature in dirtbikes and four-wheelers.

The current cabin is very small, with room for perhaps eight to sleep uncomfortably (there are only two tiny bedrooms). The design pictured at left is for a theoretical bunk-house to be added to the property to help remedy the lack of accommodations. The style is based on the current cabin, and on a larger tradition of wilderness and camp architecture (thinking specifically of the great Adirondack camps of the Nineteenth Century). In plan, the house contains a central living/sitting volume that divides the structure into symmetrical halves, each containing two ground-floor bedrooms, with sleeping lofts above. A wood stove at the center of the main room would provide the minimal heat needed during the peak periods of occupation (Memorial Day and Labor Day). Since running water and electricity are unavailable in the area, this cabin is built without any kitchen or bath fixtures. The existing cabin has cooking facilities, and an outhouse is nearby for when nature calls.

This was a fun little cabin to design. Sometimes the most uncomplicated things can be the most rewarding ideas when they get put on paper. Such a cabin would be easy to build, serve its purpose well, and blend in with the current, minimal, built context. Perhaps, with a source of funding yet to be determined, it could be built someday (rather cheaply, I would wager).  

Design for a Library

Inspired by my recent post about the Bibliotheque Nationale de France, I engaged in a bit of library design myself. The result is a structure that attempts to meld Beaux-Arts classicism with a touch of Art Nouveau decorative whimsy (perhaps it could even be classified as an American interpretation of the Baroque). I am quite happy with the overall composition, though there are some things that I would likely change if I were to start over.

The inscription on the bottom comes from the Old Testament book of Sirach and reads, "Wisdom breathes life into her sons and gives help to those who seek her." I thought it relevant to include this quote in order to present a library as a place to seek wisdom.