Output details
34 - Art and Design: History, Practice and Theory
Glasgow School of Art
Churches in the Modern World: Roman Catholic Church Architecture in Britain, 1955 to 1975
This exhibition on catholic church architecture between 1955 and 1975, which Dr Ambrose Gillick co-curated with Dr Robert Proctor, presented nine significant case study buildings using new archival research, new and archive photography, new drawings, original architects’ sketches and quotations, alongside important quotations from documents of the period, including the Second Vatican Council. The case studies were selected to illustrate three key themes in the research: Tradition and Modernity; Devotion and Liturgy; Church and City. The exhibition was designed by Collective Architecture to be freestanding for placement in non-traditional venues such as churches. It was shown at seven venues ranging from major cathedrals of the period to the Lighthouse centre for Architecture and Design in Glasgow. It is the first time that this period of church architecture has been comprehensively researched and the exhibition venues have brought new knowledge to a wide set of new audiences.
The exhibition was one of the outputs from a research project funded by the AHRC and the Paul Mellon Centre (Proctor is the Principal Investigator and grant-holder), other outputs of which include conference papers and a book, to be published in 2014. Dr Gillick's contribution to this output included primary research in archives and architectural practices, discovering significant new material on the subject, making and preparting plan drawings and photographs, collaboration in exhibition design, and organising venues for the exhibition. It is estimated that the exhibition was viewed by 15,000 visitors, often coinciding with major events at these venues, including, for example, the Liverpool Biennale and Heritage Open Days.
