Din nou despre bisericile zilelor noastre

Articol preluat de pe blogul arh. Nic Tulban

În ultima vreme, ne “încântă” ochii proiecte de biserici¹ cu forme nemaivăzute în acest program de arhitectură. La fel cum s-a făcut, de exemplu, acum două secole în amurgul formelor baroce, aici, la noi, în est. În ambele perioade, de fapt în continuitatea ultimelor trei jumătăți de veac, constantă este doar întrebarea “Ce legătură au aceste forme cu ortodoxia?”.

Există o suită de pricini pentru acest defazaj în interiorul arhitecturii ecleziale ortodoxe, între expresia formelor și spațiilor și modul lor de utilizare. Evident, ele nu pot fi expuse întru totul și epuizate de un singur om pe câteva rânduri. Efortul necesar pentru a începe o resincronizare ar putea depăși timpul și gândirea unui singur om, dacă nu chiar cea a unei generații². Dar important este a începe măcar sesizarea existenței problemelor și, mai mult, exprimarea acestora. Ordinea în care voi arăta câteva dintre ele acum și, poate, mai târziu, este pur aleatoare. Datorită lipsei pretenției de a acoperi întreaga problematică a arhitecturii ortodoxe a zilelor noastre, expunerea nu are legătură cu gravitatea sau cu importanța problemelor.

Pentru un arhitect, la abordarea unui nou program, funcție de complexitatea acestuia, are loc un proces de informare, proces care poate fi de durată sau nu. Informarea se va face din domeniul arhitecturii în primul rând, dar are loc și o investigare, mai profundă sau mai superficială, despre activitatea care se desfășoară în clădirea ce urmează a se construi. Pentru orice funcțiune, această informare poate duce la elaborarea unui proiect mai mult sau mai puțin reușit. În regulă, se poate spune, acest rudiment de abordare se poate aplica și pentru construcțiile ecleziale. Totul ar ține, și în cazul acestora, de talentul arhitectului. Dacă ne uităm la tot ceea ce se construiește pe la noi, cam în orice domeniu în care se construiește, observăm că suntem deficitari la acest capitol. Natural, cu ceva excepții (și acestea concentrate cam în zona centrală a capitalei). Dacă ne concentrăm atenția pe clădirile de biserici, constatăm cu mâhnire că excepțiile sunt greu de identificat și foarte lesne de numărat. Ceea ce ne face să ne întrebăm de ce.

Ca o primă observație, putem pleca de la ceea ce se spune în mod curent – anume că ceea ce lipsește arhitecturii bisericii ortodoxe este de fapt o aliniere la “spiritul timpului” în care trăim. Ea nu presupune neapărat "efortul supraomenesc" de a găsi modul de folosire al formelor și tehnologiilor arhitecturii contemporane pentru realizarea bisericilor. Această abordare, obișnuită azi, este greșită. Pentru că ea exprimă în înțelegerea arhitecturii un duh străin ortodoxiei. Este duhul voluntarist al teologiei voluntariste occidentale³. El se exprimă în cult prin voința oamenilor, în frunte cu pastorul, în a se aduna și face cultul. În ortodoxie, cultul este doar o racordare la cultul ceresc, preexistent din veșnicie. Duhul ortodoxiei nu este cel al voinței omului de a face, ci cel al voinței omului de a lăsa Duhul să facă.

Astfel, abordarea arhitecturii bisericii în cheie occidentală este voința arhitectului de a “crea” spațiul pentru cult – care este voința pastorului și a oamenilor. Abordarea ortodoxă este cu totul diferită – arhitectura este doar refacerea spațiului în care are loc alăturarea la Liturghia cerească a cultului.

Aici este una din principalele dificultăți de înțelegere a rostului arhitectului în ortodoxie. El trebuie să se scuture de ideile preconcepute ale creatorului de spațiu, ale celui care vrea să conformeze funcțiunea la spațiu prin ceea ce i-a pus la dispoziție profesia. Abordarea trebuie făcută exact invers. Arhitectul trebuie să înțeleagă că spațiul bisericii există. Există din veșnicie. Misiunea lui este doar de a-l pune în forme vizibile în timp. Aparent, pentru aceasta nu trebuie să fie decât un artist fără imaginație. Brutal și cinic spus, nu are de făcut decât adaptarea unui proiect tip. Proiect tip care există dinaintea lumii. Dar acest proiect tip nu-i poate fi livrat pe calc pentru a-l reproduce, a face sistematizarea verticală și a-l preda liniștit. El este livrat în ample descrieri, care încep de la Sfânta Scriptură și până la noi. Aceste descrieri nu sunt făcute de arhitecți (sau poate, arareori, sunt ceva constructori care au pus și ei în cuvinte demersul lor). Ele nu sunt nici desene. Sunt povești. Pentru înțelegerea lor este necesară trăire. Nu pot fi înțelese din exterior. Este necesară o stare anume pentru a fi permeabili la ele – rugăciunea – care nu este o cerere sau un mijloc de comunicare a unei doctrine sau ideologii, ci este chiar starea de rugăciune, starea, odihna sufletului înaintea lui Dumnezeu.

Revăzând arhitectura bisericilor ortodoxe doar prin acest raționament, ni se deschid perspective pentru percepția unui nou hiatus, de data aceasta strict în modul arhitecților de a vedea acest program. Fară a intenționa a grăi lucruri mari, pot spune că cea mai mare parte a bisericilor clădite la noi sunt proiectate folosind forme moderne sau pastișat baroce (de ex. proiectul pentru catedrală) și mod gândire cu certitudine baroc⁴. Ruptura între expresie și conținut este evidentă. Rezultatul este definit printr-un cuvânt temut: Kitsch.

Și de acest “verdict” sunt responsabili toți arhitecții care evită trăirea. Adică cei mai mulți.

P.S. Despre acest tip de Kitsch într-o postare ceva mai încolo :)


1Mă refer aici direct la cele mai multe dintre proiectele de biserici prezentate în volumul “Concursuri pentru catedrala patriarhală ortodoxă: 1999-2002”, NOI Media Print, București – ediție îngrijită de arh. Augustin Ioan. Dar de asemenea, proiectele de biserici făcute publice (și unele edificate, mai mult sau mai puțin schilod) până la sfârșitul anului 2010, nu sunt excepții de la cele spuse în rândurile de față.

2Chiar dacă, în domeniul teologiei, efortul colosal al părintelui Dumitru Stăniloae, poate contrazice această afirmație.

3În el se ascunde de fapt ideea pașoptistă a renunțării la “înapoierea” noastră, datorată în principal ortodoxiei, pentru a ne alinia la mărețele cuceriri ale științei occidentale.

4Termenul 'Baroc' este folosit aici pentru a desemna un mod exterior de abordare al creației, îm special arhitecturale, în ortodoxie. L-am folosit ca fiind caracteristic pentru înstrăinarea ortodocșilor de ortodoxie la începutul sec. XIX. Perioadă în care arhitectura ortodoxă, în plin avânt revoluționar de pregătire a momentului 1848, a absorbit din occident întreg balastul de gândire și expresie artistică vizibil și acum.

Arh. Nic Tulban

THEOLOGY OF SPACE: ORTHODOX ARCHITECTURE IN THE NEW CENTURY

by arch. Inga Leonova, AIA

No architect can rebuild a cathedral of another epoch embodying the desires, the aspirations, the love and hate of the people whose heritage it became. Therefore the images we have before us of monumental structures of the past cannot live again with the same intensity and meaning. Their faithful duplication is unreconcilable.
Louis Kahn[1]

In ecclesiastical architecture, the stark 20th century principle of “form follows function” poses an interesting and somewhat ambiguous problem. Conceptually, Christian understanding of life presupposes that since all human activity should ideally be directed toward worship of the Divine, it therefore assumes theological significance. While this might seem a stretched argument in some areas of life, it is certainly a valid principle in ecclesiastical art and architecture.


It has been argued that the theological significance of places of worship is an acquired quality. Colin Cunningham, for example, states that “a church building is not the essential basic element in Christian worship”[2], supporting his statement by evidence that the first Christians often worshipped in the open air or in various enclosed spaces of no templar significance, and that the symbolic definitions associated with sacred space developed very slowly. I would like to argue that architectural space is highly significant in Christian worship, that its organization derives from the both the functional requirements of the liturgical process and the spiritual aspects of people’s perception of their environment, and that its development is an organic process which should ideally follow the living tradition of the Church as well as progress of other human activities such as building technology.


Understanding of what theological definition of space means in terms of material reality can help redefine the architectural principles that govern the design of contemporary Eastern Orthodox churches. Unlike Western ecclesiastical architecture, the live continuity of Orthodox architectural tradition, as it relates to other aspects of Orthodox art and theology, has suffered various interruptions at different points in history, resulting in the somewhat disappointing current condition of Orthodox church architecture. An explanation for this can be found in the political history of the Eastern Orthodox world, with Orthodox countries either suffering under Muslim occupation for many centuries (Middle East, North Africa, Greece, Bulgaria and the Balkan states), or going through violent internal political changes that were often unfavorable for the Church (Russia).


However, over the course of the last 150 years the geopolitical climate in Eastern Europe had changed, and it finally became possible for the Orthodox tradition to begin to reinvent itself. Greece gained independence from the Ottoman Empire in the mid-19th century. In the beginning of the 20th century, the Communist revolution in Russia and the banishment of religion has led to the exodus of the Orthodox to the West, to Czechoslovakia, Germany, France, and finally, America. The second event more than the first has led to resurgence in interdenominational communication, and the subsequent creation of the ecumenical World Council of Churches. Orthodox theological thought has experienced a true renaissance, fostered by the necessity to redefine the Church’s position in the transformed world. Seventy years later, Russia overthrew the Communist regime, and the Orthodox Church regained its position as the principal religion of the state.


It is worth noting that the globalization of the Western world over the last 100 years has redefined its cultural and ethnic boundaries. Whether the Orthodox choose to be aware of it or not, their ethnic churches no longer exist in a vacuum, neither liturgically nor architecturally. The International Style of the early 20th century virtually erased ethnic architectural frontiers, and nowadays it would be possible to construct an entire homogeneous city out of buildings selected at random and indifferently from Moscow, Paris, Jerusalem or New York. By the same token, the Orthodox population of the world is also no longer limited to Eastern Europe. In Western Europe as well as in both Americas, there are several Orthodox Churches with numerous congregations, each struggling to define its identity in the context of the larger Orthodox world as well as the world as a whole.


Re-establishment of an independent mentality in the Orthodox Church, as well as in other areas of cultural and political thinking, has not been a smooth process. In church architecture, although new construction has been quite prolific, especially in the last 20 years, it appears that, more often than not, designers opt to fall back on vernacular origins. The architects of the present-day Orthodox churches struggle with both the burden of the nostalgic ethnic vernacular (such as the notion that there can be no Orthodox church without an onion dome), and more importantly, the lack of a clear understanding of what defines the Orthodox worship space beyond the familiar paraphernalia. Numerous attempts to force the Orthodox liturgical process into the religious forms of the West, without a clear understanding of what defines a particularly Orthodox space, have always been unsuccessful. The problem is not in the change of form as such, but rather in the deliberate imposition of an archetype on a particular existing function, forcing the function to adopt rather than transform the archetype. As a result, those churches become merely “easternized”, decorated with Orthodox paraphernalia, perpetuating the stereotype of Orthodox space as one delineated by a multitude of icons.


Unfortunately, or perhaps consequently, there is also a scarcity of architectural research on the subject of contemporary Orthodox liturgical architecture. The rich and diverse study of sacred space in contemporary Western architectural theory is typically oblivious to Orthodox architecture, perhaps due to a shortage of notable modern buildings, as well as the low profile that the Orthodox Church maintains in the contemporary world. One of the examples can be found in Richard Kieckhefer’s seminal book Theology in Stone, which, although it begins with Byzantine examples of “sacramental churches”, eventually gravitates toward Western “sacramental liturgy”, thereby leaving a whole archetype beyond the limits of the book.[3] Alternatively, most of the writing on Orthodox architecture is produced within theological liturgical research. At best, this work considers these buildings from the purview of art history, and is typically concerned only with historical examples. There is also ample architectural research focused on the religious buildings produced during the seventy years of the Communist regime in Russia. However, political constraints obliged this research to limit itself to the physical and historical properties of church buildings, completely ignoring the theological aspects of worship space.[4] Sadly, the inertia of this imbalanced approach carries into the present day. On the other hand, the proliferation of churches built by immigrants in Western countries over the past century has not yet attracted the attention of architectural researchers. Even Frank Lloyd Wright’s amazing Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church in Milwaukee remains one of the least studied of his buildings. Surely the time has come to fill this void in the architectural thinking, and to endeavor to suggest the contemporary understanding of space and material in the Orthodox church building.


To this end it appears necessary to determine what, if anything, defines the uniquely Orthodox perception of built space. It is essential to separate what can be considered fundamental to the concept of space as it reflects the function of the liturgy, and what is the veneer of local traditions and ethnic stereotypes that have obscured the utilization of space and consequently the understanding of the liturgy. The liturgical tradition of the Orthodox Church is considered by many to be the most conservative of any currently practiced in the Western world. To some, it means that the Orthodox church buildings should also remain frozen in time. There exists a body of apologetic writing, typically by architects of “revivalist” churches, that argue that since the tradition has been interrupted, the only appropriate path for a modern church designer is to go back in time and faithfully replicate the forms and materials of what is considered the “high age” of a particular ethnic liturgical architecture.[5] However, the quote from Louis Kahn that has been used as an epigraph to this essay appeals to me as highly valid argument. I would like to contend that there must be a way to acknowledge the past without resuscitating its forms. Architecture, as any other art form, is rooted in its time and its culture, and while its best achievements transcend the confines of time, still the distinction must be made between the objective principles, and the subjective particulars of a given period. To use an example from the realm of music, the classical overtures in Alfred Schnitke’s Concerti serve to connect his works to the great classical music tradition, but were the composer to write a pseudo-Baroque piece, which is something he was certainly technically capable of, it would have been, no matter how skillfully done, nothing but a pale shadow of the period since it would have been completely misplaced in music history.


To understand the challenges facing the modern architects of the Orthodox church, one must begin by examining the historic development of Orthodox architecture, and attempt to reconstruct the aspects of this architecture that are essential for the process of the liturgy as well as the Orthodox theological awareness of built environment. The great wealth of Orthodox ecclesiastical architectural tradition should be utilized to inform, but not govern, the church construction of today. I believe that the example of the 20th century Orthodox theologians can serve as a guide for following a similar process in architectural research. Clarifying the underlying historical principals of the organization of Christian worship space, as well as engaging in a dialogue with contemporary Western architects on this subject, should only help to establish the guiding principles of contemporary Orthodox church design. Orthodox architecture can and should reconcile itself with the profound necessity “to build churches out of that reality which we experience and verify every day”[6], while remaining faithful to the definition of an ecclesiastical building as that whose primary function is to be an epiphany of Divine and human transcendent co-celebration. Ultimately, the design should respect the primary concept of the Church as a body of Christ, and remember that this body is built of “living stones”[7], not suspended in time and frozen in tradition, but growing as the world grows…


© 2005, Inga Leonova
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[1] Louis Kahn. Monumentality, in Peter Twombly, Louis Kahn: essential texts. W. W. Norton & Company, New York/London, 2003, p.22.
[2] Cunningham, Colin. Stones of witness: church architecture and function, Sutton Publishing Ltd., 1999, p. 3
[3] Richard Kieckhefer. Theology in Stone. Oxford University Press, 2004.
[4] I would suggest that perhaps one of the last endeavors to analyze Orthodox art in its living context was made in 1918, at the crest of Russian Revolution, by Eugene Troubetskoy. After that, research tended to address singularly historical subjects.
[5] See, for example, Marina Golokova. Church architecture: tradition and modernity. St. Petersburg Construction Weekly, August 2004; A. Anisimov. Contemporary Orthodox temples: construction experience. Construction Technologies, no. 1, 2004; and many others.
[6] Rudolf Schwarz. The Church Incarnate: the sacred function of Christian architecture. Henry Regnery Company, Chicago, 1958, p. 11.
[7] 1 Peter 2:4-6

Source: http://holytrinityorthodox.org/

Manualul arhitectului bizantin

Interpretarea arhitecturii bizantine se face ţinând cont de succesiunea evenimentelor şi de specificul diverselor arii geografice. În studiul arhitecturii bizantine relaţia spaţiului construit cu oamenii care îl trăiesc este fundamentală. Orice afirmaţie, orice judecată având ca subiect spaţiul construit în Imperiul de răsărit nu poate face abstracţie de viaţa comunităţii pe care acesta o adăposteşte. Pentru a înţelege şi a explica arhitectura bizantină este necesar a înţelege temeinic atât oamenii, cât şi comunităţile care i-au dat viaţă. În studiile recente se construiesc tipologii, pentru aceasta se analizează mai multe clădiri diferite dintr-o zonă restrânsă sau mai multe clădiri asemănătoare dintr-o regiune sau chiar din întreg imperiul. Se fac clasificări funcţie de materialele de construcţie, funcţie de tehnici, se discută clădirile după modul în care răspund la seism. Pentru a construi o teorie a arhitecturii bizantine se folosesc o sumedenie de tehnici de abstractizare. Se analizează planul, se analizează secţiunea. Se clasifică: planul bazilical, planul central, planul în cruce înscrisă.

O asemenea abordare poate fi utilă, convenabilă, necesară pentru un domeniu de cercetare care trebuie să acopere o arie atât de vastă şi o perioadă de timp extinsă. Bineînţeles, obiectivitatea absolut necesară cercetării nu poate fi înlăturată. Întreaga cercetare ştiinţifică se bazează pe necesitatea clasificării, pe găsirea unor similarităţi. Dar a te limita în a aplica doar aceste metode în cercetarea arhitecturii bizantine duce la organizarea materialului disponibil in primul rând în raport cu caracteristici din planul secund, ceea ce face ca elemente esenţiale să fie scăpate din vedere. Or scopul unei cercetări nu este nicidecum acesta.

Pentru a porni o cercetare în arhitectura bizanţului, este necesară înţelegerea clară a întregului lanţ de transformări care au avut loc în viaţa Imperiului începând cu Constantin cel Mare. Pe toate planurile. Arhitectura este organizarea spaţiului, articularea suprafeţelor interioare şi exterioare şi formularea detaliilor interioare şi exterioare. Izolarea acestor aspecte nu poate fi făcută decât teoretic. Dar una din problemele majore în abordarea arhitecturii bizanţului (chiar în abordarea arhitecturii în general) este că sumara definiţie a arhitecturii dată mai sus este înţeleasă a se referi strict la spaţiul tridimensional cartezian în care trăiesc oamenii pe pământ. Abordând astfel, ne limităm la a vedea arhitectura bizantină ca simplă geometrie a formelor folosite în acea perioadă, ceea ce induce imposibilitatea perceperii acesteia ca şi componentă vie a imperiului.

Problema, în schimb, este mult mai complexă. Spaţiul construit bizantin este doar o proiecţie pe spaţiul tridimensional, cartezian, al mediului care ne înconjoară, a întregului complex fenomen bizantin.

Nicolae Tulban 

Citeste mai departe aici

Orthodox architecture - making history in America today

Any pilgrimage to the "old" Orthodox countries is not complete if one does not visit some of the historical Churches built with much faith, dedication and love by our forefathers. Who can go to Constantinople and not visit Hagia Sophia, who can go to Thessaloniki and not visit the Church of Saint Demetrios, who can go to Kiev and not visit Lavra Pecerskaya, who can go to Romania and not visit the monasteries of Bukovina? These gems, preserved with many sacrifices through the centuries, continue to attract admirers, not only among the Orthodox, but also from people of other religious beliefs. They have something to say beyond the stone and the crafts, something spiritually deep that transcends their exterior beauty.
Why do I mention all this you may ask? The answer is simple, because living as an Orthodox in America I miss the churches from the old country. With few notable exceptions most of the Orthodox Churches in America do not even remotely resemble with a traditional Orthodox structure. We can invoke the lack of money, we can invoke the lack of engagement of the faithful, but the result is the same, we have started to loose the meaning of a traditional Church sacred space.
Because we live in a soup of thousands of different so called Christian denominations, we, the Orthodox, are in danger of loosing our identity that was so dearly preserved across the centuries by generations of martyrs. You hear people asking nowadays: why do we need to build traditional Churches? Why do we need domes, vaults apses and the sort? This is a waste of money; a cheap square building with generous space for pews should be enough to worship God!
Nothing can be more wrong than this. An Orthodox worship space cannot be conceived without these features. The domes, vaults, apses and icons are all intimately and permanently attached to the idea of being Orthodox. They are not just simple architectural elements, stripped of any essential significance like other human creations, but rather they are eternal and true expressions of the One and Holy Spirit of the Orthodox Faith. Nothing in the Orthodox sacred space is done without due consideration, nothing is superficial, but all has a meaning and a distinct purpose.
All the architectural elements are meant to introduce the faithful that enter therein in a state of prayer and heavenly admiration. The domes have been created using the pattern of the heavens that stand above us expressing through their majesty the Byzantine idea that Church has a world-wide mission. The vaults and the apses represent the rainbow, the covenant between God and Noah, but also the loving embrace of Mother Church. This is why in the Apse of the altar you always find represented the Mother of God, spreading her arms toward a humanity in need of her divine love and care. The icons that cover every inch of the walls represent true windows to the Kingdom of Heaven as they reveal to the faithful the transfigured world depicted in them.
Even in the worst times of war and suppression, the Churches were adorned with gold and most precious materials and craftsmanship, because the space of the Church is a representation of the Jerusalem from above, the Kingdom of heaven where even the poorest man on earth, if has faith, can enter and rejoice as a king in union with Christ the King of all! The Church building itself is a promise for a better world where nothing is missing, where everything is fulfilled. We adorn the Churches not for the pride of men, but as a promise of the future life and Kingdom.
Knowing all this we come to understand that the closed space of the Temple opens in fact thousands of doors to the other world above, a world that awaits us to join them into eternal life.
Through our traditional architecture we have something important to communicate. Now, more than ever, the Orthodox architecture is not a simple "nice to have" but is a "must". We are called to make again history today, to be brave and visionary builders like the emperors of Constantinople. Of course we don't have their means, but that does not imply that we need to abandon our traditions. One single person cannot do much, but as a community we can accomplish together so much more. We have to wisely seek the balance between tradition and resources so we can create something that will meaningfully express and preserve our wonderful heritage.
Above all we need to understand that nothing, and especially a Church, can be built without sacrifice, without reassessing our priorities in life. The churches of old were built on the sacrifice of our martyrs; the churches today have to be built on the sacrifice of our frivolous pleasures and the re-channeling of our resources toward what really matters for us today and for our children tomorrow. Only upon this communal sacrificial act we'll be able to build a Church that will endure, uniting us all into Christ our God.

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