A church or a landscape installation?

I´m sharing all these pictures by Filip Dujardin from archdaily.com because I´m absolutely delighted with this installation. Though, I´m still thinking if it is just landscape art or it could be a church.

I had a discussion about it with my architect husband, he said ¨it´s just art,¨  but I reminded him about all the Apocalypse movies we have seen, there´s always and empty or destroyed church and people is still feeling it as a church, because you have this feeling that this is still God´s house.

For example, here is a screen shot from the movie ¨End of days¨ (From http://getfilm.co.uk/film.php?id=9946). Arnold Schwarzenegger is finally praying and it will be a matter of seconds that you´ll see the church in flames, with explosions and the devil inside. But Arnold looks at the angel and he feels faith.

This is another example. The abandoned church with zombies inside (screen shot from theofantastique.com), from The Walking Dead, 1st episode of season 2. After killing them, one of the human mothers is praying to God to save her girl, it doesn´t matter the condition of the church.

So, examples apart, I´m thinking how I would feel inside a church that is mixed with the landscape, with only one cross on top, no images of Christ or Saints inside. Maybe it´s the great communion with the landscape what is needed to feel in peace.

From archdaily.com:

Architects: Gijs Van Vaerenbergh

Location: Looz, Limburg, Belgium

Stability: Ney&partners

Execution: Cravero bvba (steel) / MEG (foundations)

Initiator: Provincie Limburg / Z33

Year: 2011

Photographs: Filip Dujardin

‘Reading between the lines’ is a project by the duo Gijs Van Vaerenbergh, a collaboration between young Belgian architects Pieterjan Gijs (Leuven, 1983) and Arnout Van Vaerenbergh (Leuven, 1983). Since 2007, they have been realizing projects in public space together that start from their architectural background, but have an artistic intention. Their projects do not always originate out of the initiative of a classical client, for example, and carry a large degree of autonomy. Their primary concerns are experiment, reflection, a physical involvement with the end result and the input of the viewer. 

‘Reading between the lines’ is part of ‘pit’, an artistic trajectory with works by some ten artists in the region of Borgloon-Heers (in the Flemish province of Limburg). ‘Pit’ will be the first part of the exhibition project Z-OUT, an initiative in which Z33, the contemporary art museum of the city of Hasselt, presents art in public space (see also www.z33.be). On September 24th, Gijs Van Vaerenbergh will reveal a construction in the rural landscape, by a cycle route, that’s based on the design of the local church. This ‘church’ consists of 30 tons of steel and 2000 columns, and is built on a fundament of armed concrete. Through the use of horizontal plates, the concept of the traditional church is transformed into a transparent object of art.¨

http://www.archdaily.com/298693/reading-between-the-lines-gijs-van-vaerenbergh/