Faith

This project is on-going; I am studying the different types of places of worship in the seaside city of Brighton and Hove where I live.

This project is on-going; I am studying the different types of places of worship in the seaside city of Brighton and Hove where I live. The distinct types of religious beliefs around the world continue to be a contentious issue for many people as we advance in the 21st century. Religion as a cause is often cited in conflictual situations as being the reason for extreme views and non-humanitarian behaviour. The philosopher Karl Marx was quoted as saying ‘Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, just as it is the spirit of a spiritless situation. It is the opium of the people.’ Additionally, Richard Dawkins argued back in 2006 that religion was the root of all evil, swapping the word from money. In this series of photographs I wanted to explore whether I could identify evidence of conflictual influences, what are the comfort zones in a place of worship? Are they places of refuge or more ominously controlling in the way they invite people to worship? And can a sense of power or care be identified by observing their traditions and sanctity; does a visible common thread exist that connects different types of religious practice?

This project was initiated by photographing the internal layout of different places of worship, concentrating on the, perhaps, opulence, simplicity, presence of religious icons, or just the space itself etc. with the intention of expanding my insight and knowledge of what I am doing as I observe them further.

The images presently included in this submission represent a number of faiths that I have been able to access, however, I do hope to visit all of those represented in Brighton and Hove moving into the future, enabling me to fully document in more detail their practices and settings and the impact they have on our everyday lives as believers.

The photographs were taken during a single visit to each place of worship and reflect exactly the layout as I found the space at that time; no major alterations were made to the images apart from a small amount of cropping and brightening as no flash was used, respectively. My reason for doing it in this way was to try to capture my own feelings about being in each faith space. I noticed that my feelings towards a space varied depending on the simplicity of it, perhaps being more absorbed by the atmosphere, tranquility or pure mysticism.