This doctoral thesis describes the cultural history of Dutch church architecture in the twentieth century, a period in which more than 5,000 churches were built in the Netherlands. The majority of... Show moreThis doctoral thesis describes the cultural history of Dutch church architecture in the twentieth century, a period in which more than 5,000 churches were built in the Netherlands. The majority of these houses of worship are not listed buildings and suffer from a lack of maintenance. Because of the country’s overwhelming secularization, more and more churches are vacant, for sale or slated for demolition. The absence of any general study of the function and significance of modern churches in the Netherlands complicates the discussion in religious, cultural and political circles about the future of this vulnerable group of buildings. One major factor in the design, decoration and organization of these churches was the liturgical renewal within the Roman Catholic Church and two Protestant religious communities, the Nederlandse Hervormde Kerk and the Gereformeerde Kerken in Nederland. The democratic impulse to foster greater participation in services by the congregation had an aesthetic dimension. At the same time, demographic and urban developments put pressure on congregations to construct new churches at a rapid pace. Priests and pastors looked to architects to accommodate their liturgical and pastoral preferences by designing distinctively modern churches. In the late 1960s, both Catholic and Protestant churches became functional houses of worship, drained of their traditional sacred character. Show less
This research focuses on a new field of artistic research in which a visual artist takes on the role of researcher. The main research question is whether performance art integrated in an ecumenical... Show moreThis research focuses on a new field of artistic research in which a visual artist takes on the role of researcher. The main research question is whether performance art integrated in an ecumenical service, combined with artistic directions from the artist, can enhance the religious experience of those taking part in the church service. I set my research against theology and Ritual Studies by describing my ideal image of a liturgical service and by comparing this personal view with the viewpoints of several theologians. Furthermore I examined the theories of the psychology of religion to search for an description of the concept of religious experience.The artistic experiment I set up in order to answer my main research question comprised a set of church services with several integrated performances. In this research I counted, described and analysed a total number of seven religious experiences. From the description and analyses of the experiences it became clear that these were indeed brought about by the performance rituals in the church services. Show less
This study investigates four complete sets of Daoist wall paintings, termed Heavenly Court paintings (chaoyuan tu) and depicting a court audience of Daoist deities in heaven, of the thirteenth and... Show moreThis study investigates four complete sets of Daoist wall paintings, termed Heavenly Court paintings (chaoyuan tu) and depicting a court audience of Daoist deities in heaven, of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries in the context of related Daoist ritual practices, mural production, and personalisations. After outlining the history and development of Heavenly Court painting in China, it explains the conceptual framework on which painters based their design, how this design was built up, and why patrons modified some elements in the design thus accounting for differences between the wall paintings Show less
