This is one I really wanted to experience on my own, in person. But alas, London is still too great a distance from Prince Albert, Canada for a weekend trip!
Essentially, a large Sun on one wall, a huge mirror on the ceiling and mist in the air, made up one of the best visited art installations in years.
"The great thing about this installation is the way in which it seems to make everybody happy. It cuts across all boundaries; young and old alike lie on the floor and gaze at their reflections in the ceiling mirror. At busy times - particularly at the weekend - it is fun to see people try to spot themselves. It seems that families have cottoned on to the fact that it makes a fabulous children's playground. Kids tear around the room having fun - and no doubt get home completely exhausted.
The strangest moment yet - a visitor brought in his blow-up canoe and sat there surrounded by strangers pretending to paddle towards the sun. He seemed quite an ordinary man, middle-aged and reasonably well dressed. He packed up and moved on after 15 minutes."
Over 2 million people made a trek to the Tate to experience this phenomenon. They danced, they held picnics, they sang, played games, spelled words with their bodies and at least one couple tried to do more than just spelling...
People travelled, and I imagine, paid an entrance fee, to experience this room, this installation. They really weren't going to an event, or to visit friends, they were going to experience something. And many reported a most pleasurable, happy time in that place.
Where am I going with this?
What would it look like for the church to have such installations?
Should we be building and creating spaces that draw people? Not build nice buildings with comfortable seats, but create amazing places and spaces that people will travel to and spend money on to attend. Was this what the cathedrals of old were about? Where are our amazing spaces today?
Not just a church made out of glass, but a space that moves the spirit...
If it's true that the artists are the prophets to this generation, then we need to give them the resources to create amazing spaces that speak to a generation.
Now, where can we go with this...
It seems that most of our church space is so utilitarian. Don't you think that over the past generation we have tried to make the space useful?
ReplyDeleteSo we have great kitchens and classrooms and comfortable, sometimes versatile, seating. But we don't have space that inspires awe or a sense of the sacred. We have to work rather hard to create these sacred spaces. I would love to have a space with art that inspires the spirit to a sense of awe and wonder and sometimes pleasure, sometimes tears.
I wonder what our kids would put in these types of spaces?
It's a difficult issue in my mind. Would we do this to fill pews, or to facilitate worship? I guess the question I have is should anything besides Jesus draw people to church?
ReplyDeleteThat being said, I agree with Linea that modern churches are utilitarian. They must have a sizeable gym and kitchen, padded pews, and current colours and styles. It seems to me that if we are going to the money on a fancy building (which is an issue with me as it is), it could be put to better use.+
Marc - I guess I would see such a space drawing people to Jesus rather than drawing them to the church. I understand that we don't want to invest all sorts of money just into spaces when there are people to minister to. That is a hard balance - to invest in people rather than buildings but also to create spaces for people where they can be drawn to something more than their humdrum lives, to God himself.
ReplyDelete"If it's true that the artists are the prophets to this generation, then we need to give them the resources to create amazing spaces that speak to a generation."
ReplyDeleteArtists are NOT the prophets to this generation - except maybe false ones.
I have a major, major problem with big decorated churches. They can either become objects of veneration themselves within a tiny space of time - certainly less than a generation. Or they become burdens for those that have to manage them when the Spirit says something different. 'Whitespace' churches are best IMO, because they you have a canvass where God can create. And it's funny how, when I'm writing this I'm thinking of counter arguements. But I really don't want to see human work 'canonised' as it is in some places.
Reverence is greatly over-rated in the traditional church and a little under-rated in the charismatic church. I think the freedom we have been given to see stuff as just furniture and buildings - rather than having a holiness of thier own - is a huge release from unrighteous bondage.
When the millenium dome was open we did the trip. There were some interesting installations there, but although you could lay on your back soaking up atmosphere, there was a great deal more stimulation and excitment from doing the same thing in a cornfield on a sunny day.
Humbug ;-)
i took my family to experience it a few times - its great.
ReplyDeleteSorry Randall - that came across a bit harsh. But I really feel that although art is an expressive medium, that's as far as it goes. I just can't place a high value on art, in the same way I can't value music like that. Or, say, fine wine beyond a certain point.
ReplyDeleteNow call me a Philistine.
Wow, I'm glad for the response!
ReplyDeleteAndrew: Yours was probably the family that had a picnic there!
Toni: I hear you brother, i really think I do!
I spend to much energy and time explaining to a few people here that the table on the stage is just a table!! That the holiest things in the room, are us.
I agree that some have gone too far in declaring church spaces "Holy" or sacred or untouchable.
And Marc, I totally agree that Jesus is the reason we gather. If we get weird on that, then everything begins to crumble.
What I'm talking about, (and I believe it's different), is a space that causes the spirit, our spirits, to be engaged.
A space where even an atheist would enter and feel something bigger than his own self.
For me it's like driving through the mountains and driving around a curve and the whole expanse of a snowcapped mountain range opens up before me. Causes me to loose my breath, my spirit is engaged, and I call out to God in gratitude.
I don't know that it's possible to do in a church building or a corner of a building. Heck I don't even know if it's possible to create that kind of thing in a public place.
But that's my question. can we create spaces, not just churches, but spaces, that invite spiritual interaction and engagement?
Almost as a way of connecting people with spirit, and then with God?
This may sound facetious (but it's not meant to be), but I suspect that it can't be done in a public space--at least not in any material form. If I walk into a medieval cathedral, for instance, I think "Wow, what a magnificent building," but it doesn't inspire me the same way that the rocky mountains or anything else in nature does. Perhaps the problem is me, I don't know. I guess I'm thinking that the only thing that could inspire even an athiest is God's presence, the attitude (read: love) of those who attend the church, and the moving of the Spirit.
ReplyDeleteMaybe that's a pat answer. Maybe I misunderstand what you are saying. Maybe I simply don't know what I am talking about.
Marc - I think you have the key. It's not places but presence. Sometimes God seems to leave his presence on a place that catches people like that. I'm sure that's one reason that certain buildings became venerated. God's presence had been there, and the people in ignorance worshipped the effect instead of the effector.
ReplyDeleteI have another take on 'holy buildings' (lower case deliberate) too. People couldn't come up with the real thing in a way that they could control, so they faked it. Actually that sums up my feelings about bells and smells, surplice and liturgy too. It's a performance to suggest that something Holy and Majestic is present, when the reality is nothing of the kind.
FWIW I have on this desk a book called 'the thrill of tradition'By James Moffat, based on the James Richards lectures given to the university of Virginia. With an Oxymoron for a title like that I HAD to pick it up. It's the second edition, published in 1944, before the 'taint' of Charismatic renewal. I'll be intrigued to see if it talks about handing down faith or practice. We shall see.
I came across this quote just 2 clicks from here:
ReplyDelete"Everything in my ****** is taken from National Geographic magazines -- which felt sacrilegious enough, ripping beautiful pictures from an almost sacred anthropological source."
I know what they mean, but for some, applying the idea of sanctity to man-driven endeavour has become completely natural.
I don't mean to suggest, however, that there isn't a place for reverence in the church. Reverence is an attitude, not a location or a piece of furniture. It would mean, for instance, that before the church service starts we move into the sactuary and take time to pray and reflect, as opposed to what is normally done: gab and gossip until the drums kick in. I don't mean to say that there is something wrong with fellowship, but there is a time and place for it.
ReplyDeletePart of me wonders if our lack of at least some degree of reverence has led to what Deitrich Bonhoeffer calls "cheap grace". Services easily turn in to social gatherings, with a little Jesus-in-my-heart in the sermon. I'll readily (but somewhat shamefully) admit that often the only reason I get up for church is the fact that I have friends there, and church is the best place to arrange a lunch get-together or an evening coffee. Granted, that's mostly my own problem. Church isn't about "fun", at least not in the conventional sense. People are not changed by their faith--they simply make the "Jesus-in-my-heart" request and go on with their lives.
I'd be careful before claiming that "thrilling tradition" is an oxymoron. I think as we move forward as a church we should always keep an eye on the tradition. Don't do away with it simply because it is "tradition".
Sorry this is so long. And, Toni, this isn't meant as a personal attack. I'm simply responding with some verbal diarrhea.
You may yet be proved correct, Marc. The first chapter quotes a lot of different speakers, of which this is a representative sample:
ReplyDeleteChrist our Lord said I am the truth, not I am the convention. Whatever then savours of being contrary to the truth will be heresy, even though it be ancient custom.
Tertullian in De Virginibus Velandis