George Breeden Blog 5

Reading: Sacred and Profane Beauty, by Gerardus Van Der Leeuw

Emptiness in Building

Van Der Leeuw writes: “The influence of emptiness, too, is found in architecture, especially in Islam… In the empty mosque the eye is irresistibly drawn to the empty niche which shows the direction of Mecca for prayer.” (p. 208) Emptiness as an aspect of architecture is kind of an odd concept. This strangeness comes out of how we commonly related to architecture as simply being useful. When we look at emptiness in a building we ask ourselves what is the utility of that? Is it a place of storage? Does something belong there that is missing? These are the questions that we are conditioned to ask. The reality is that emptiness represents so much more meaning then something that is useful. Van Der Leeuw mentions its importance in Islam, but emptiness is also important in many eastern traditions. Such as in Buddhism, where emptiness represents the ultimate in many ways. It would be interesting to question if Buddhist buildings also contain places of emptiness. But that is just my thought.