Shouldn't churches evoke feelings of divinity instead of oppression? (I know it's popular to hate on brutalist architecture, but really isn't a place of worship the last place you'd want it?)
I don't really see what's oppressive about any of these buildings. Many of the qualities of the divine are recognizable in these churches. Simplicity, transcending of the natural world, and so on.
When people talk about the divine, especially in the Abrahamic traditions, it's common to talk about what God isn't. (negative theology). You shouldn't make an image of God. To approach the divine is to remove everything that isn't divine and experiencing what is left over.
And I think that's fantastically realized in the austerity of these churches. I've visited some of them, my favorite one isn't actually mentioned here, it's a pretty small church outside of Osaka, the Church of Light by Tadao Ando. (https://youtu.be/7ZtfYOD5I8M)
Many of the brutalist churches I’ve seen do not, IMO, “evoke feelings of oppression” (aside from any one might have as a result of personal conflict with the religious institution behind them, which is a separate issue.)
Including, I should mention, most of those in TFA.
I suppose we just have to chalk it up to different tastes in art. To me, my first thought on seeing most of those pictures is how they look like settings for some implausibly dystopian sci-fi movie.
No doubt. I find these churches amazingly beautiful.
I also think in the sense of how a church in 1500 was not a relic of the past the way we view a church from 1500 today. I would say a church from 1500 was much closer to what the churches in this article would have been in 1500.
Of course, there is a real issue that while I find these amazingly beautiful I would never go to one because I am not the least bit Christian or religious.
I don’t have a car, but I would love for the parking garage near me look like the churches in the article (putting aside the practical differences in requirements). Similarly, I would welcome one on these church buildings replacing one of my neighborhood churches just to give us something different to look at.
Probably the most famous Brutalist public art in Texas, the Fort Worth Water Gardens, was indeed used in filming of Logan's Run.
I've generally found the Brutalist buildings in Texas rather ugly on the exterior at least, but did find a sense of comfort in occupying them; perhaps there's something cave-like and solid about their atmosphere. I did enjoy visiting the Water Gardens; I think it's a good expression of the style.
However, many of the churches pictured here are on another level. Something about the austere concrete juxtaposed to the wooden pews (and speaking as someone raised Catholic, it's hard to imagine a pew brutal enough to satisfy god) works quite well for me. I'm really impressed by some of these.
Yeah, it's different tastes. I'm split on these in a different way than I've seen in the other comments, because I generally hate brutalist buildings from the outside, but think the interiors are fantastic (including most in TFA). When it comes to churches I think that's somehow symbolically appropriate.
Brutalism IMO relies on imposing designs. In outdoor spaces, this can lead to feelings of oppression, as anyone who has traversed a high-rise complex at night can attest.
When there is enough space, such as in a church, library, public transport infra etc, the concrete monoliths suddenly become more distant and less threatening and you can really appreciate the effect of being in some kind of ancient future ruin.
I disagree. Brutalism is based on dropping any pretense of the material used to construct the building. No shiny glass veneer or facade, just concrete buildings reveling their concreteness with no artifice. If large middle age cathedrals are supposed to inspire a sense of the devine, then IMO brutalist churches inspire a sense of guilelessness.
A point of brutalism is "form follows function and "showcase the bare building materials" (1) - in other words, that's how the material looks, naturally. Bare, unpainted concrete is in fact more natural and honest than painted concrete. And brutalism deliberately leans into that naturalism (of modern materials).
The impression of Unnatural comes from the fact, that brutalist forms don't exist in Nature. Concrete is everything but not a natural material. Showing it isnt natural.
I am still buffed they are people defending brutalism. It is one of the biggest mistake in Architecture and one day these buildings will vanish.
They tend to look like something someone who didn’t give a shit made. “I just need a box for people to be in, who cares what it looks like?”
The example brutalist churches in another post here look like someone doing a horrible experiment in the Sims made buildings without bothering to use anything but some default wall texture they found buried in the dev tools that doesn’t even tile very well, because they just needed a place to torture Sims in and don’t care what it looks like.
I don't see it that way at all. A lot of care and thought went into these designs, and they evoke the kind of awe you would expect from a god's house. These aren't just hulking concrete bunkers like some of the institutional brutalism you see.
We were generally talking about brutalism and I searched shortly about sloppy designed example (besides many real life example I am unlucky forced to see)
Please think more next why people disagree with your opinion. Also see it as a hind to be more thoughtful why brutalism is so unpopular.
Depends on who you ask. It's a somewhat common belief that churches should be plain and unadorned and that religious art can lead to idolatry. Ideas like that were particularly popular among early Protestants.
Depends on your scale. On one hand, all institutions are oppressive at some level. On the other, Christianity is the foundation of the free society you (most likely) live in.
I wouldn’t give so much credit to Christianity, or any religion. The modern west is built on enlightenment ideas, not least of which is the separation of church and state.
is it though like really? >6 billion people in the world actively identify with one religion or another but in terms of ratio there are more memes on social media about athesim than religions at least on my AI curated feed
There is plenty of hate speech towards non-believers if you look a little bit for it. In fact, I'd even say that as unfunny and overseen atheists memes are, they are the most tame of all religious critic online.
