Revelation Church (Berlin)

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The Protestant Revelation Church at Simplonstrasse 31-37, Berlin-Friedrichshain

The Revelation Church is a Protestant church in the Berlin district of Friedrichshain . It is one of a total of 43 emergency churches that were built in Germany after the Second World War based on a design by the Bauhaus architect Otto Bartning . It belongs to the Evangelical Parish Boxhagen - Stralau in the parish of Berlin Stadtmitte . In addition to the wooden Methodist Christ Church (wooden church of Swedish construction), the Revelation Church is one of two very different types of emergency churches built in Friedrichshain after the Second World War .

Emergence

The Church of Revelation, autumn 1949
The Church of Revelation, autumn 1949

Otto Bartning, who is one of the pioneers of series production and assembly construction, transferred this principle (he first used it in sacred buildings in the world-famous steel church in 1928!) To his so-called emergency churches after the Second World War. According to his design, 43 churches were built in Germany between 1948 and 1951, which were built in a combination of foreign and self-help. For each of the emergency churches that were built, a donation of US $ 10,000 came  from abroad, the prefabricated wooden trusses for the basic structure of the church were delivered and only finally assembled on site, rubble stones were often used to fill the scaffolding, and the work was done on site Community involved.

Anyone who interprets hardship in terms of lack of building materials or cheap, is wrong: What was meant was that these new buildings should put an end to spiritual hardship and wandering after the war through high symbolic power (tent in the desert). Nevertheless, the post-war shortage dictated the construction concept. “So stone had to be exposed stone, wood grown wood and steel uncovered steel,” said Bartning in his address at the inauguration of the first emergency church in Pforzheim.

The Revelation Church, the first new church in Berlin after the war, was donated by the Swiss Aid Organization of the Evangelical Church. For the construction of the church, the community swapped a plot of land on Wühlischplatz for a plot of land in Simplonstrasse , on which rubble had to be removed first. The foundation stone was laid on September 21, 1948. After only one year of construction, the church was consecrated on September 25, 1949. The attached parish hall could not be completed until 1954.

The building

The Revelation Church is an elongated building with a polygonal choir . The church area receives light through a continuous ribbon of windows. The roof is covered with wooden shingles and has a ridge turret. A parish hall has been built in the west.

The basic structural idea are wooden arches placed one behind the other that support an outer skin. All components are visible, nothing is hidden. The arch of the roof construction, rising from the very bottom, still suggests its roots in Expressionism.

In 1962 the organ was added, following the building concept, not on the gallery, but visible in the community's field of vision. In 1979 the chancel was redesigned and the interior walls whitewashed. In 2002–2005 a comprehensive restoration was carried out in line with listed buildings.

The Revelation Church has been the main church of the merged community of Boxhagen-Stralau since 1998. The new congregation gradually developed from four congregations until 1998. The village church Stralau and the Zwingli church belong to the municipality of Boxhagen-Stralau today . The chapel (Church of the Promise ), which is also in the municipality and was used by one of the predecessor municipalities (the former Promise Church ), is no longer used by the municipality.

See also

Web links

Commons : Church of Revelation  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. Revelation Church in the district lexicon of the Luisenstädtischer Bildungsverein
  2. History of the Church of the Resurrection of the Protestant Johannesgemeinde Pforzheim (the prototype of the Bartning-Notkirchen)
  3. ^ History of the Revelation Church on the homepage of the associated parish Boxhagen-Stralau
  4. Revelation Church in Otto Bartning's work database

Coordinates: 52 ° 30 ′ 26.1 ″  N , 13 ° 27 ′ 41.1 ″  E