CHAPEL OF ST. IGNATIUSSteven Holl

program: Jesuit Chapel client: Seattle University

size: 6100 sf

SPACECase Study - EVDA 621 .01

Josh Taron and Graham Livesey

By Jeff Clarke

“...we measure time but how can we measure what does not exist...?” -Saint Augustine

“To open ourselves to perception, we must transcend the mundane urgency of “things to do.” We must try to access that inner life that reveals the luminous intensity of the world.” (1)

In this statement, Holl expresses his vision of the chapel of St. Ignatius as not a mere reflection of what exists in society but an urgency to express a space that will become a society. The Chapel of St. Ignatius is an amalgamation of the global and the local. In re-sponse to St. Ignatius’s vision for the Jesuit church to have “seven vessels of light” Holl’s design breaks spacial boundaries between the interior and exterior, sacred and secular, the within and without and transcends the distinction between self and other, person and building. (1) This building, in line with St. Ignatius work in the 16th century, offers a space to express a social organization based upon ahistorical flows in contrast to norms of the secular world. Here transformation occurs on a local, personal level, which supercedes the logic of social organizations in Seattle and in turn “global pow-er” will begin to escape “socio-political control” of this “historically specific local/national society.” (2)

In addition to social structure, the interior of the chapel of st.Ignatius smooths each programmed space through changing light patterns lines that do not generate a center. What is normally a striated and directional space becomes more so nomadic in a sense that sensory perception, particularly visual, is always changing in time. The space transforms into continuous variations of light, material and texture as the disciple is under continuous spiritual trans-formation.

“...the striated is that which intertwines fixed and variable elements, produces an order and succession of distinct forms, and organizes horizontal melodic lines and verti-cal harmonic planes. The smooth is the continuous varia-tion, continuous development of form; it is the fusion of harmony and melody in favor of the production of properly rhythmic values, the pure act of the drawing of a diagonal across the vertical and the horizontal.” (3)

In contrast to a space of continuous variation, the chapel of St. Ignatius is also a space of dwelling for the spirit. “To dwell, to be set at peace, means to remain at peace within the free, the preserve, the free sphere that safeguards each thing in its essence.” (4) The success of Holl’s design can be measured through the experiences of individuals. One visitor experienced a sense of dwelling upon entry. “She found herself forced to sit down on first entering the interior, as she was so completely overcome by emotion and memory.” (1)

References:

1. Holl, Steven. The Chapel of St. Ignatius. New York, U.S.A: Princeton Architectural Press. 1999. 2. M. Castells, “The Space of Flows,” in The Rise of the Network Society, John Wiley and Sons, 2009.3. Gilles Deleuze and Feliz Guattari, “1440: The Smooth and the Striated” in A Thousand Plateaus, University of Minnesota Press, 1987.4. M. Heidegger, “Building Dwelling, Thinking,” in D.F. Krell, ed. Martin Heidegger Basic Writings, Harper, 1993.