Why are you finding brutalist architecture oppressive?

They tend to look like something someone who didn’t give a shit made. “I just need a box for people to be in, who cares what it looks like?”

The example brutalist churches in another post here look like someone doing a horrible experiment in the Sims made buildings without bothering to use anything but some default wall texture they found buried in the dev tools that doesn’t even tile very well, because they just needed a place to torture Sims in and don’t care what it looks like.

Yeah, that comes off as oppressive.

The oldest churches direct you to the heavens and God.

Early modern churches direct you to the preacher.

Modern churches direct you to the architect. (Or building repair services depending on whom you ask.)

I don't see it that way at all. A lot of care and thought went into these designs, and they evoke the kind of awe you would expect from a god's house. These aren't just hulking concrete bunkers like some of the institutional brutalism you see.

Maybe these architects should think, why their "well thought" experiments just look lazy designed.

They don't. Are you telling me that you look at this and think "what a lazy design"?

https://static.dezeen.com/uploads/2024/04/sacred-modernity-b...

30 seconds of Google search https://www.re-thinkingthefuture.com/wp-content/uploads/2020...

You think this is well thought.

That isn't one of the buildings we were talking about. Indeed, in the post you responded to, I contrasted them with

> hulking concrete bunkers like some of the institutional brutalism you see.

Please make more thoughtful responses in the future.

We were generally talking about brutalism and I searched shortly about sloppy designed example (besides many real life example I am unlucky forced to see)

Please think more next why people disagree with your opinion. Also see it as a hind to be more thoughtful why brutalism is so unpopular.

Yeah, I mean it seems to me you just searched for some random picture and made literally no commentary about it. It looks completely fine.

I always find it weird when people have this „everyone hates it“ attitude with no real commentary whatsoever.

I made several comments on this thread about the problem on this architecture.

Do you live in a area with brutalism ? (if not , why do you like it?) Have you ask random passengers about their opinion?

It's not natural, grey is a stupid colour, no ornaments. Only architects like brutalism.

But I am happy to know that brutalist churches in Germany will be destruct at first than older churches.

> It's not natural

A point of brutalism is "form follows function and "showcase the bare building materials" (1) - in other words, that's how the material looks, naturally. Bare, unpainted concrete is in fact more natural and honest than painted concrete. And brutalism deliberately leans into that naturalism (of modern materials).

1) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brutalist_architecture

The impression of Unnatural comes from the fact, that brutalist forms don't exist in Nature. Concrete is everything but not a natural material. Showing it isnt natural.

I am still buffed they are people defending brutalism. It is one of the biggest mistake in Architecture and one day these buildings will vanish.

> I am still buffed they are people defending brutalism

You are confused, describing is not the same as defending.

> It is one of the biggest mistake in Architecture

I don't necessary agree, but I didn't even take a position on that.

> and one day these buildings will vanish.

Over enough time, so will all buildings. But the sturdy one will last longer.

Bricks and glass panels also don’t exist in nature. Only we humans bring them about, just as we do with concrete.

The forms used in classical architecture are way more natural than just stupid plain concrete.

Yes, it would be more natural to live in a cave or a wooden hut. There's a long essay on the subject from a guy named Ted who put it into practice.

Brutalism is beautiful

Haven't the churches been [historically] oppressive?

I get that it's popular to hate on religion too ;), so I suppose that's ironic to some.

is it though like really? >6 billion people in the world actively identify with one religion or another but in terms of ratio there are more memes on social media about athesim than religions at least on my AI curated feed

There is plenty of hate speech towards non-believers if you look a little bit for it. In fact, I'd even say that as unfunny and overseen atheists memes are, they are the most tame of all religious critic online.

Depends on your scale. On one hand, all institutions are oppressive at some level. On the other, Christianity is the foundation of the free society you (most likely) live in.

I wouldn’t give so much credit to Christianity, or any religion. The modern west is built on enlightenment ideas, not least of which is the separation of church and state.

They could soften it up by adding some plants. Eco-brutalist!

Depends on who you ask. It's a somewhat common belief that churches should be plain and unadorned and that religious art can lead to idolatry. Ideas like that were particularly popular among early Protestants.

Many of the brutalist churches I’ve seen do not, IMO, “evoke feelings of oppression” (aside from any one might have as a result of personal conflict with the religious institution behind them, which is a separate issue.)

Including, I should mention, most of those in TFA.

I suppose we just have to chalk it up to different tastes in art. To me, my first thought on seeing most of those pictures is how they look like settings for some implausibly dystopian sci-fi movie.

No doubt. I find these churches amazingly beautiful.

I also think in the sense of how a church in 1500 was not a relic of the past the way we view a church from 1500 today. I would say a church from 1500 was much closer to what the churches in this article would have been in 1500.

Of course, there is a real issue that while I find these amazingly beautiful I would never go to one because I am not the least bit Christian or religious.

Somewhat to that last point, my emotional reaction to these structures would be completely different if I knew they were designed to be car parks.

I don’t have a car, but I would love for the parking garage near me look like the churches in the article (putting aside the practical differences in requirements). Similarly, I would welcome one on these church buildings replacing one of my neighborhood churches just to give us something different to look at.

Probably the most famous Brutalist public art in Texas, the Fort Worth Water Gardens, was indeed used in filming of Logan's Run.

I've generally found the Brutalist buildings in Texas rather ugly on the exterior at least, but did find a sense of comfort in occupying them; perhaps there's something cave-like and solid about their atmosphere. I did enjoy visiting the Water Gardens; I think it's a good expression of the style.

However, many of the churches pictured here are on another level. Something about the austere concrete juxtaposed to the wooden pews (and speaking as someone raised Catholic, it's hard to imagine a pew brutal enough to satisfy god) works quite well for me. I'm really impressed by some of these.

Yeah, it's different tastes. I'm split on these in a different way than I've seen in the other comments, because I generally hate brutalist buildings from the outside, but think the interiors are fantastic (including most in TFA). When it comes to churches I think that's somehow symbolically appropriate.

Interesting, nearly all the photos in the article did for me.

Brutalism IMO relies on imposing designs. In outdoor spaces, this can lead to feelings of oppression, as anyone who has traversed a high-rise complex at night can attest.

When there is enough space, such as in a church, library, public transport infra etc, the concrete monoliths suddenly become more distant and less threatening and you can really appreciate the effect of being in some kind of ancient future ruin.

> Brutalism IMO relies on imposing designs

I disagree. Brutalism is based on dropping any pretense of the material used to construct the building. No shiny glass veneer or facade, just concrete buildings reveling their concreteness with no artifice. If large middle age cathedrals are supposed to inspire a sense of the devine, then IMO brutalist churches inspire a sense of guilelessness.

our perhaps evoking the feeling of being a part of something bigger than yourself? which brutalist architecture absolutely does.

I don't really see what's oppressive about any of these buildings. Many of the qualities of the divine are recognizable in these churches. Simplicity, transcending of the natural world, and so on.

When people talk about the divine, especially in the Abrahamic traditions, it's common to talk about what God isn't. (negative theology). You shouldn't make an image of God. To approach the divine is to remove everything that isn't divine and experiencing what is left over.

And I think that's fantastically realized in the austerity of these churches. I've visited some of them, my favorite one isn't actually mentioned here, it's a pretty small church outside of Osaka, the Church of Light by Tadao Ando. (https://youtu.be/7ZtfYOD5I8M)

Gothic architecture also feels oppressive, at least to me. I believe that is working as intended; dread and awe bring us closer to the divine.

Not to me. I find it uplifting and joyous. I find the same of the best of the modern churches (brutalist or otherwise0

How does divinity feel? According to the bible you drop dead instantly if you gaze upon the face of God.

These church spaces eschews color and decoration and instead shape the light and the space itself to give you a feeling of the divine.