Light & Engineering 33 (3) 2025

Volume 33
Date of publication 06/18/2025
Pages 4–11

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Metaphysics of Natural Light in Cult Architecture L&E, Vol.33, No.3, 2025

Articles authors:

Kirill A. Solovyov

Kirill A. Solovyov, Ph. D. of Cultural Studies, Associate Professor of the Department of Architectural and Construction Design and Construction Physics of the NRU MGSU. In 1983 he entered, and in 1989 graduated from the Moscow State Historical and Archival Institute, now RSUH. From 1983 to 2001 he worked in the State Museums of the USSR and the Russian Federation, the State Historical Museum, the A.V. Shchusev State Research Museum of Architecture, the Central Museum of Ancient Russian Culture and Art by Andrey Rublev. In 2010, he defended his Ph. D. thesis in the Dissertation Council of the State Academy of Slavic Culture. Since 2001, he has been teaching. Since 2007, he has been teaching at NRU MGSU at the Department of Architectural and Construction Design and Environmental Physics. He is also an Associate Professor of the Department of History and Theory of Decorative Art and Design of the Moscow State Stroganov Academy of Design and Applied Arts. His research interests are cult architecture, the history of world religions, the basics of architecture and the history of the development of building structures

Abstract:

This article is devoted to the use of light in the architecture, and especially of cult architecture. For many centuries, people have considered the light of the sun and the flame of a candle to be the best ways to glorify God. The culture of light and its symbolic significance in cult architecture have passed through the centuries. The Bible has always identified God, Christ, truth, virtue, and salvation with light, and godlessness and the devil with darkness. The Caliph of the Omeyyid caliphate, Muawiya, wrote that “… Muslims are people of the Law, whereas Christians are people of the Book and Light …”. Light has always been associated with a miracle, magic, a mystical gift from the powers of heaven. The medieval metaphysics of light was reflected in the development of cult architecture. The cult space is based on sheaves of light that cut through the naves, passing through the open-work-stained glass windows. This is exactly what Abbot Sugerius, the founder of the Gothic style in architecture, writes about the Cathedral of Saint – Denis: “The hall shines, illuminated in the middle, because it shines merged with the illuminator, and that which pours out a new light (luxnova) sparkles like nobility itself” [1].

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Keywords

DOI: https://doi.org/10.33383/2024-082

Article in RUS:
Svetotekhnika # 2, 2025, pp. 27–33

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