Stillness and Light: The Silent Eloquence of Shaker Architecture

5. Time: Cyclic Light

time•cyclic light 5 Ministry Hall Meetinghouse Pleasant Hill, Kentucky 94 shadoW Play on liMestone Pleasant Hill’s limestone dwellings are extremely responsive to shifting skies. Displayed upon their white volumes are all of the sun’s refracted colors, including faint hues often missed by the human eye. With its walls aligned to the cardinal points, each building behaves as a gnomon, registering and showing the flow of shade from plane to plane, as well as at the microscale of masonry texture, produced on the Center dwelling by raised white mortar. Grazing Sun on East Façade at Noon Center Family Dwelling House Pleasant Hill, Kentucky View from Southeast at Dawn Center Family Dwelling House Pleasant Hill, Kentucky 96 The absolute white of a Shaker meetinghouse, as prescribed by the Millennial Laws, gave each village a spiritual center of maximum purity and radiance. But maximized also on the plain and highly reflective clapboards was a visibility of each passing moment, and each new emanation of sun. Melting the sky into walls are delicate tones of colored light, ranging from the soft grays of overcast weather and starched whites of clear days, to the transparent yellows and violets arriving early and late, and deeper blues and oranges of twilight. View from Northwest at Sunrise Meetinghouse Sabbathday Lake, Maine sPeCtr al Colors West Wall at Sunset Meetinghouse Pleasant Hill, Kentucky 98 Dappled shadows cast onto walls from neighboring trees turn noticeably bold, and cinematic, on a perfectly white meetinghouse. As if thrown onto a blank projection screen, shadows tell of the slant of sun and weather conditions, but also convey the time of season by their relative thinness or density. Revealed as well by swaying shadows is the presence of wind, painting walls with a fluttery time that derives from the sky but whose tempo is not the same as the sun. Afternoon Shadows on West Façade Meetinghouse Pleasant Hill, Kentucky tree shadoWs Morning Shadows on East Façade Meetinghouse Sabbathday Lake, Maine 100 When a low, and almost horizontal, beam of sun penetrates into a shadowy room, at daybreak or sundown, its patch of light takes on a spellbinding presence, as does its slow progression around the walls. Set against empty planes and placid space, the concentration of energy appears to the eye as a luminous figure, and constitutes a metaphysical reality that is more real at that moment, and throbbing with life, than anything around it. Left. Bar of Setting Sun on Entry Door Meetinghouse Sabbathday Lake, Maine Facing. Dawn Sunbeam and Window Refractions in Ministry Staircase Meetinghouse Sabbathday Lake, Maine sPlashes oF sun Bent Streak of Sun in Ministry Hall Meetinghouse Sabbathday Lake, Maine Refracted Sun in Meetingroom Meetinghouse Sabbathday Lake, Maine 104 Adjoining white rooms with contrasting window orientations foster a multiplicity of time states. Windows might illuminate one space with warm sun, while its neighbor is coolly washed with violet sky, or cast bluish-green by light filtered through trees, making the different moments of waxing and waning energy simultaneously visible. These celestial hues grow in presence, as they are mutually intensified in the human eye through simultaneous and successive contrast, making yellows appear yellower and violets more violet than they actually are. Left. Dawn View into Meetingroom from Side Entry Meetinghouse Sabbathday Lake, Maine Facing. Afternoon View from One Elder’s Room to Another Meetinghouse Pleasant Hill, Kentucky Coexisting tiMe states 107 Facing. Morning View from East to West Ministry Rooms Meetinghouse Sabbathday Lake, Maine Above. Passage to Meetingroom Center Family Dwelling House Pleasant Hill, Kentucky 108 Dispersions of sun off highly reflective and warm-colored floors can completely transform a simple white room. The faintly yellow rays become further tinted when bouncing off floorboards of unpainted pine, or coatings of paint that are reddish-yellow or yellowish-red. At the same time, enigmatic rising shadows are cast from below and, due to the floor’s mirror-like finish, bright spots ricochet onto ceilings to double the brilliance. As this golden light reaches into every corner, the room is bathed in an ambient hue that Shakers identified with heaven. Left. Ministry Corridor at Sunset Meetinghouse Sabbathday Lake, Maine Facing. Ministry Hall at Midday Meetinghouse Pleasant Hill, Kentucky golden Cast 110 Below. Dining Room at Dawn Church Family Dwelling House...