☉ Pulpit Rock Church is a proposal by fānum atelier for AWR Competitions in 2017. It is located in Forsand Norway in a mountain setting. Its scale is small. Key materials are glass and wood. Review the 2 proposals for the same competition.
«Whereas the beautiful is limited, the sublime is limitless, so that the mind in the presence of the sublime, attempting to imagine what it cannot, has pain in the failure but pleasure in contemplating the immensity of the attempt.» – Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason
Logbook
In the early hours of the afternoon I decide to walk to the Pulpit Rock, a cliff nestled in the Norwegian fjords.
The sun is going down when a slight mist begins to spread slowly. But in the distance a light catches my attention: I see an object that raises from the landscape as if it doesn’t want to camouflage itself with the environment.
I continue my path, wrapped in the silence of these uncontaminated spaces until I can perceive the brightness and grandeur of that building, bringing me closer and closer.
I’m fascinated by the diaphanous playing of the transparencies and at the same time, I’m disturbed by that stern and solemn appearance.
Finally, I arrive at the top, where I find that those bright transparencies, glimpsed during the walk, belong to a church: the crystal roof is based on a dark platform from which the entrance comes out; It seems like an invitation to enter in, so I accept it ready to discover the interior.
Walking through the door, I follow the path indicated by the wall, driven by a gentle glare, which becomes stronger turning to the right and finding myself in a large white space flooded with light.
My astonishment is great, so I sit on a chair in contemplation, listening to the wind noise that breaks on the translucent walls. I can perfectly perceive the relationship with nature.
A new element gets my attention: a big glass window, from which admiring the panorama, suggests one point of view.
I am bathed in the crystalline light of the church and at the same time projected out into the uncontaminated purity of the landscape. I am in this church, in an osmotic relationship with nature.