The Art of Time (4)
Hanford Time
Art of Time 3

    The Art of Time (continued)

     Objects venerated in shrines need not be ancient or religious. What is most important is that they remind us of our past and the things or ideas that we hold to be important. In public parks, schools and libraries around the country, we have placed "Freedom shrines" which contain reproductions of the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution of the United States, the Bill of Rights and other documents important to American freedoms. These shrines don't actually venerate the documents themselves, but rather venerate and preserve the ideas contained within them. If we had rolled these documents up and placed them in a jeweled box, the point would have been missed.

     Throughout art and architecture history we see that builders don't simply set aside objects for veneration but ideas as well. Recall the stupa structures we saw earlier. While they may contain the relics of a saint their outer form is also significant -- reflecting the builder's ideas about the nature of the universe.

    Freedom shrine

    Hindu Temple at Khajuraho

     Athenian Acropolis

     Similarly Hindus built temples that also represent the universe. It is believed that at the center of the universe is the mythical mount Meru. Therefore, over the sanctuary of every Hindu temple there towers a model of this mythic mountain. The image of a mountain as home to the gods and as a form reflected in architecture is an archetypal image found in many cultures. We see it's form in ancient Greece where the Greeks believed the gods lived on Mount Olympus and so they built temples high on a hilltop overlooking the people living below. The mountain form can also be seen in the ziggurats of ancient Mesopotamia and in the stepped pyramids of Central America. During the Middle Ages builders constructed cathedrals not modeled after a mountain top home of the gods but based on ideas of the New Jerusalem as described in the Book of Revelation, and on the concept of Noah's Ark. The word "nave" which is used to describe the central space of the sanctuary, comes from the same root as our word "navy" and suggests the cathedral was an ark or ship for transporting souls to heaven.

     Perhaps some of the most universal ideas found built into ancient art and architecture is geometry. Because geometry is absolute, eternal and unchanging ­ in contrast to our earthly lives ­ it has been used by all religions to express what is eternal and unchanging. While interpretations vary it is often thought that perfect geometric forms are closer to the ideal realm of the divine and hence more real, more true than the physical world we see around us everyday.
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