Color, Mon Dieu: A Case-Study Comparison Between the Church Of the Epiphany (New York City) and Kresge Chapel (Cambridge, Massachusetts)
Keywords:
Color, lighting, visual perception, digital, designAbstract
This paper offers a case-study comparison of the atmospheric effect of the manipulation of color and light in two modernist religious spaces: The Church of the Epiphany by Belfatto and Pavarini in New York City, New York (1965-1967) and Kresge Chapel by Eero Saarinen in Cambridge, Massachusetts (1953-1955). The chosen religious compounds are located in similar climates and with geographic coordinates in close proximity; as a result, the sites have similar locations for sun angles in summer and winter. They house the worship of differing religious practices and are located in urban areas (in contrast to previously researched Midwestern case-studies). As the religious building is a genre typically designed to invoke heightened spiritual experiences, the paper examines how the design choices of each architectural team affect the color experience inside. This proposed paper specifically exposes major massing decisions (placement of mass and volume of buildings), material choice, sculpting of light, proximity of color zones, and location of colors in relation to visitor experience. [...]
References
But, first, let us review that the long, culturally- established tradition that light = sun = divinity /god/ goodness/glory. To examine just a few of the roots of this narrative tradition, remember that in fairytales, gold is the symbol of good. Heros and heroines are gold-haired, wearing gold garb and weaponry, sprinting horseback in metallic forests. Even from southern climes where towheads are less common, the fairytale protagonists are frequently blonde. The presence of the coloring and light reflectivity of these golden items symbolizes the radiance of the sun. So, too, in contemporary culture’s modes of storytelling, the Hollywood cinema technique of backlighting heros and heroines exemplifies this method of heightening a perception of a figure’s glory and/or goodness [2] [3].
Harry M. Benshoff, Sean Griffin. America on Film: Representing Race, Class, Gender, and Sexuality at the Movies. Malden, MA: Blackweel Publishing, 2004, p. 236.
Max Lüthi, The Fairytale: As Art Form and Portrait of Man. Translated by Joh Erickson. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1984, pp. 13-16.
Walker Art Center and Minneapolis Institute of Art, Eero Saarinen Shaping the Future, No. 72, Minneapolis, MN: Walker Art Center and Minneapolis Institute of Art, June 6, 2008, p. 3.
www.kubuildingtech.org.
Antonio Roman, Eero Saarinen: An Architecture of Multiplicity. New York: Princeton Architectural
Press, 2003, p. 14.
http://www.designboom.com Andrea DB, “Doriana Fuksas Interview”, August 26, 2011.
http://www.architectural-review.com/ Michael Webb. “Raphael Moneo’s Iesu Church in San Sebastian.”
http://www.archdaily.com/ Andrew Kroll, AD Classics: Church of the Light/Tadao Ando, January 6, 2011.
http://www.stevenholl.com/ quoting Sheri Olson from Architectural Record, July 1997.
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The "Cultura e Scienza del Colore - Color Culture and Science" journal is registered at the Court of Milan at n.233 of 24.06.2014.
The journal is an open access journal, free for readers and authors and has joined ROAD, the Directory of Open Access scholarly Resources, since 2014. Articles published in the “Cultura e Scienza del Colore - Color Culture and Science" journal are open access articles, distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The copyright is retained by the author(s).
