Monika Pietrosian, AOS, 2015

Urban space as an illustration of social tensions

Churches vs. city tissue in Iasi

1. CITY AND A CHURCH.

First thing that Ive noticed in Iasi were churches. Lots of churches, spread within a city
without any clear rule. In fact there is one church for every 2 km2 of the city. There seem to be
even more, because of the hilly topography of the terrain. Starting from Saint Nicholas Church
from Iasi, through good (Basili Lupu) and bad (Jan Sas) times with most of them built in XVII
and XIX century. Now not so many are still raised, probably because of the depopulating of the
area, emigration, weakening of religious beliefs and last but not least because there are
already many. In this case these buildings survived long enough to exceed the times they were
created in and gained a new meaning. Iasi is sometimes described as open-air museum. As it is
mentioned in A brief history of religion in art - TED-Ed, museum is a rather fresh concept,
because we see the pieces of art regardless of their religious context they once had. Whats once
has been a temple starts to become a piece on exhibition because of the change in its
surrounding.
2. OWERWHELMING CITY TISSUE.
Recently there was a project about Polish churches which were built during communist period. It
may have appeared to be disadvantageous period for believers, but actually around 3000
churches were built in the whole country. Moreover, due to new functional program of the
Catholic Church, established on Vaticanum II architects, who already felt that system is going to
fall, gained great artistic freedom and political power. While Arka Pana in Nowa Huta - temple
as a result of grassroots movement in new, entirely industrial city was called The Church in the
City without God, communist industrial development of Iasi could be described as Profanation
of the City of God. Churches between dormitories, city malls, detached houses, office buildings
lose their former importance. Theyre not landmarks anymore. Instead of open-air museum or
temple we experience an open-air battle for attention. Alienated from each other they lose their
significance, their exposition is now much different. Human perspective takes over the spiritual
perspective. If you leave the touristic area of Iasi its much harder hard to find a church which
surroundings that are carefully designed in order to enhance its symbolic message. They just
seem to point out here and there without any good reason. Some (especially young) people
argue that there are few reasons for their existence at all. Or, at least, that there are far too many
of them.
3. HOSPITALS, NOT CHURCHES.
In bibliography I mention two interesting articles concerning comparison of doctors and
churches per capita. In fact one of them is polemics against another. What is interesting for me is
that those two types of functions where opposed. In the end one can argue that they dont have
much in common. Doctors are responsible for physiological needs and church is responsible for

Monika Pietrosian, AOS, 2015

self-transcendence, which was added by Maslow at the very top of his pyramid several years
after publishing it.
Biopolitics and biopower is a term invented around one hundred years ago. It describes
extension of the authority of the state to control not only the thoughts but also the bodies of a
population, and it refers to health policy. In Ain't Got No (I Got Life) Nina Simone sings about
something once mentioned by Mikoejko, Polish philosopher of religion: We only have right to
live, which is so easy to be tore out and it doesnt mean very much. Thats why from this
perspective life is precious and we should take care of it. Hospitals, capable of helping us in this
matter are more and more appreciated.
Different approach to life as a value is presented in Mioria, Romanian song which usually
doesnt find much understanding within western cultures. The shepherd is very calm in the face
of death and doesnt want or even doesnt seem to need to defend his life.
Why is he so calm while hes going to lose his only real value, only real property? Because
material body doesnt matter to him, in this way he saves his dignity in order to save his soul.
Thats why people who cannot satisfy even the needs from the bottom of the pyramid are often
the most religious. This is the only way they can stand their suffering.
Many of the discussions from western world urban planners starts from a condition that
human has no soul, there is no spiritual level and because of that the best what we can do is to
provide working class optimal conditions to reproduce themselves. That approach was also
substantial for an inventor of an urbanism Ildefons Cerd.
4. PSYCHOLOGY OF SACRED SPACE
If we want to talk about psychology of the sacred space, then I have to mention the
controversial thesis of Michael Jones. He suggests that together with sociology are just ways of
social engineering and they are opposition to the religion as they encourage people to concentrate
on their instincts and follow them. While being conscious of numerous attempts to describe
spirituality in scientific manner I would like to underline that complementary efforts of the
representatives of Orthodox Church are much less common. Psychology, museums and modern
huge retail spaces seem to be a deconstruction of former churchs social role. And because of this
deconstruction they are given less and less importance in the urban space. In this case we
shouldnt talk about something as psychology of a sacred space at all because its oxymoron.
What should be done then? Kevin Lynch in his book Image of the City gives us some
probable tools to approach the problem. For starters, he makes an interesting observation on
dynamic character of urbanism. Our perception of churches has changed and still changes, as it
has to respond to the changes in society, but what is important is to maintain continuity. City had
experienced various radical shifts from industrialization and modernization which has already
failed. Now city experiences aggressive commercialization, which is changing its identity and

Monika Pietrosian, AOS, 2015

causes it to lose spatial coherence. What seems reasonable is to quantify how much spirit is
still left? How important are those leftovers of history for people? You can measure responds of
the people, make them participate in the process, but you cannot measure their soul. Here comes
Hundertwasser with his criticism of rationalism and insolent comparison between architectbricklayer-occupant unity and Holy Trinity. Is he going too far? Of course he is, but he may be
on a path of getting at least part of solution.
In this case I would also like to mention his less famous experiment in which participants in
three different rooms with three different ways of finishing (normal, uglyfied, beautified) were
asked to perform some tasks. Their results were measured and it was found out that differences
in results between all 3 rooms were significant. We could make an association and tell that
churches are still the most valuable artistic public spaces that are nowadays free to attend. They
still are the homes of strong and lively community, charity and, moreover, non-government
provider of health care services. That cannot be told about some of proposals of Jan Gehl, which
mechanisms are based on a consumption and require certain kind of lifestyle to live up the space.
Quality of the urban space improves significantly and people are keener on going out. The
problem is that those are not the same people anymore, as that kind of approach results in
gentrification of redesigned areas. It seems that Iasi may have at least one advantage over
Copenhagen.
5. CHARM OF THE LACK. LOOKING FOR THE DESCRIPTION.
Because of longing for appreciation and gaining visibility Iasi loses its specifics, genius loci.
By following already created path Iasi loses a chance to be something parallel and avoid using a
model that already proved not to work. Reality of post socialist city is way different from one
from west that experienced hundred years of stable development. Therefore it requires different
actions, it can be field of experiments and new solutions for different kind of problems.
Reinventing the narrative, but with the respect to all kind of episodes that transcend through its
history.
Carmen Popescu, art and architectural historian suggest that this is somehow unfair to try to
judge eastern urban phenomenas from western point view. It seems impossible to catch attention
with repetitive, boring architecture and temples just scattered around place not resonating with a
space. How to charm people with lack lack of order, resources and possibilities?
Instead of solving the problem by urban planning both Popescu and Lynch suggest that
education can be a better tool. Whereas Lynch is talking about instruction of using the city and
set of signs to understand it (what would be better for a second step from my point of view)
Popescu suggests to start with rewriting history of modernity as a common base for a more
global context. Instead of praising western to take into account East German, Kazakhstan,
Chinese, Romanian, Polish, Indonesian, Israeli and other less disputed modernistic experience in
architecture and art well be able to find a common ground. Maybe then we will be able to
establish some way to be appreciated and recognized by each other.

Monika Pietrosian, AOS, 2015

Monika Pietrosian, AOS, 2015

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Lynch, Kevin. (1960) The image of the city, Editura Cambridge
Mass.: The Tehnology Press & Harvard University Press;
Gehl, Jan. (2014) Miasta dla ludzi, RAM, Krakw;
Hundertwasser. (1958) Mould Manifesto against rationalism in
architecture in Conrads, Ulrich. Programs and manifestos of 20th
century, The MIT Press, Massachuchusetts
Jones, Michael. (2013) Libido dominandi. Seks jako narzdzie
kontroli spoecznej, Wektory, Wrocaw
Popescu, Carmen. (2014) On a periphery of Architectural
History Looking at Eastern Europe
http://www.stiripesurse.ro/asta-e-romania-avem-mai-multebiserici-ale-diferitelor-culte-dar-nu-avem-coli-i-spitale_946432.html
http://www.activenews.ro/stiri-social/Minciuna-are-picioare-scurte.In-Suedia-sunt-97-de-spitale-la-4.000-de-biserici-in-SUA-sunt350.000-de-biserici-la-5.500-de-spitale.-Romania-are-un-spital-la43.000-de-locuitori-SUA-are-1-la-56.000.-CIFRELE-126270
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qfITRYcnP84
http://www.architektura7dnia.pl/article/wielka-budowa
http://www.przegladprawoslawny.pl/articles.php?id_n=2647&id=8
http://portretymiast.blog.polityka.pl/2013/11/23/kuba-snopek-nieprzepadam-za-janem-gehlem/