PRAYING HANDS
A MONUMENT FOR PRAYERS
When you pray, you are not alone. The action of putting your hands together when engaging prayer, has a great symbolic value of support, and is the core foundation for our vision. The proposal embeds this symbolism in a series of walls striving upwards. The dimensions of the walls grow in size, from earth towards the heaven, creating a translation from a human to a landscape scale - a symbolic manifestation of the relationship between us and God.
Praying Hands preserves the essence of the praying gesture in a physical structure that can be experienced on three different levels - as a motorist-from the highway, as a visitor on foot and online as a virtual library of answered prayers.
Passing by the monument in speed, the perception of the walls changes. As the road leads by, the monument opens up, revealing a clear structure referencing to hands folded in prayer. Initially appearing as one single wall, the monument then shows the many separate elements that form it. It is a symbolic view of how individuals or groups stand united and form one entity in prayer.
Visiting the landmark will give you a sense of wonder and awe at the greatness of the Divine. An experience of sudden and striking realization of the volume and dimension of one million prayers represented by bricks. When arriving on site, a path leads down a central axis in the middle. This large interstitial space mimics the “middle-ship” of traditional churches. Straight walls reach upwards and encapsulate the vertical view to the skies connecting heaven and earth through answered prayers.
Using social media and a website/app, you will be able to visit the landmark from anywhere in the world. It will become a vault of religious insight and knowledge about how and why people pray. As a virtual visitor, you will find yourself in a library of answered prayers that you yourself can contribute to, connecting to the physical monument and to millions others around the world.
With a slow pulsing light for every online prayer, the physical landmark communicates the new prayers that are happening. The light will create a beautiful moment for people passing by and give visitors an experience of what it is like to stand surrounded in the light of ongoing prayers from all around the world.
