Description

Like an island or a fortress, the church stands in a green field, on the outskirts of an industrial city erected­ in the 1950s. Its neighbours include both small houses and the huge centreless residential blocks and slab buildings that were typical in socialist states at that time.

The plan is a not quite perfect ellipse, a 50 metre long oval, divided in the middle. The slightly larger half to the southwest is only partly built over, the slightly smaller half in the northeast fully built on. In spite of its closed character, several buildings peel out of the complex. The church with its steep pitched roof has a collection of smaller extensions to the northwest and southeast, a parish hall with a 25 metre high pointed tower on one side and the sacristy on the other and the pastor’s residence in front of the broad gable wall. In the half-oval of the courtyard, the roof curves and continues on to form a useful and shady canopy. On the opposite side, there is a round play-house for children.

The church, the front part of which is enclosed by a two metre high perforated masonry wall, follows the typical 18th-century tradition, when Hungarian Protestant churches were not permitted to have their entrances facing the street. Here, too, therefore, one enters, as it were furtively, from the side, whether from the northwest or the southeast. The two scarcely visible passages – the one between the offices and the pastor’s residence is even covered – lead initially into the courtyard. Only from there does one reach the doors to the church.

In general, the building is axial and symmetrical in conception, constructed of brick laid to English bond. A broad strip reaching from ground to apex marks the middle of the wall next to and over the entrance. On account of its partly horizontal and partly vertical lines, this element is similar to a Gothic west window with its fine tracery, but in a typically 20th-century reduced and abstract version. The pews are arranged in a 12-by-12-metre square. The central aisle is emphasised by four chandeliers. The rear wall behind the altar and pulpit is rendered in white; all other surfaces are red like the stone or brown like the wood.

The whole complex is extremely homogenous. This impression is created by the enclosure of the ensemble, by the fusion of its elements, by the curved forms of the various buildings, by the vaulting of the individual roofs and, finally, by the almost exclusive use of red brick and pinewood. The Protestant Church in Dunaújváros is also an example of organic architecture in the Hungarian tradition. Nevertheless the building avoids – clearly to its advantage – expressive, not to say excessive symbolism and curvature.

Akademie der Künste (Ed.): Baustelle : Ungarn. Neuere ungarische Architektur, Berlin 1999, p. 64, p. 67 | Axis, no. 3/4/1999, p. 98, pp. 100- | Domus no. 804/1998, p. 45 | Morris, Alison, Lockie, Finlay (Ed.): Next. 8th International Architecture Exhibition, exhibition catalogue, Vol. 2, New York 2002, p. 71 | Stock, Wolfgang Jean: Architectural Guide Sacred Buildings in Europe since 1950, Munich 2004, pp. 310-

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Originally published in: Rudolf Stegers, Sacred Buildings: A Design Manual, Birkhäuser, 2008.