Each year we invite five jurors who represent different constituencies in the world of religious art and architecture-architects, artists, liturgical designers, clergy, and congregants – to select the winning projects in the Faith & Form/IFRAA International Awards Program for Religious Art and Architecture. After two days devoted to reviewing projects, deliberating, and making final choices, the jury has an opportunity to reflect not only on the winning projects, but also on all of the submissions, and to comment on what they have seen, what they have not seen, and the trends in the field.
This year our jurors detected the restlessness that is being experienced not only in the mainline faiths, but also in emerging worship communities regarding stylistic content in both art and architecture. Most (not all) of the jurors saw continued reticence on the part of congregations to embrace contemporary forms, modes of expression, and spatial experimentation. The jury felt that there is, instead, more interest in traditional (what some might describe as conservative) styles in both art and architecture. And the jury questioned whether faith communities are ill-served by such a lack of temerity. “Why are we so afraid?” one juror asked, rhetorically. “Why do we keep resorting to old forms? Why are we not venturing into the future?”
Ironically, one of the more adventurous clients identified by the jury was the megachurch congregation, which appeared more willing to try new architectural expressions (but not always with satisfactory results). The form of megachurch worship space is still evolving, observed several jurors, struggling to integrate worship with new technologies of video, lighting, and acoustics. This makes it hard, noted one juror, to judge whether megachurches are truly significant works of religious art and architecture.
The idea of shifting emphasis led the jury to speculate on the timeless quality of great religious buildings, and whether the permanence that has been expected from such buildings actually inhibits the experimentation that some jurors felt was lacking in the submissions. If traditional art and architecture continue to dominate the field, does this in turn make clergy, congregations, artists, and architects blind to new possibilities in worship environments? Might, in fact, less permanent environments, more adaptable designs, and buildings designed for invention better serve congregations in flux? Could such flexibility encourage experimentation in liturgy and worship style? And might it be a hallmark of “sustainable” design, in that it would keep worship environments relevant and changeable so that old spaces need not be demolished? Undoubtedly it would, and that just might be the reason there is so little open-endedness in today’s worship environments. Jurors speculated that in a conservative era of doctrine, flexibility is suspect because it invites a certain “liturgical free-styling” in the face of orthodoxy.
Such rigidity is expressed not only in the arrangement of the spaces, but also in the art that adorns the architecture. Some of the jurors detected little toleration for greater artistic expression by both artists and architects. There is more emphasis on meeting the program and satisfying client wishes. While such professional responsibility is to be applauded, might artists and architects be abdicating their role as visionaries in the realm of sacred art and architecture?
