Photo Essay: Basílica i Temple Expiatori de la Sagrada Família

Basílica i Temple Expiatori de la Sagrada Família, #67, Barcelona, 2025

“Color in certain places has the great value of making the outlines and structural planes seem more energetic.”

“Nothing is art if it does not come from nature.”

“There is no reason to regret that I cannot finish the church. I will grow old but others will come after me. What must always be conserved is the spirit of the work, but its life has to depend on the generations it is handed down to and with whom it lives and is incarnated.”

—Antoni Gaudí, 1852-1926, Catalan architect

[A couple of interesting side notes… first, poor Gaudí (pronounced gow-DEE) was killed by tram number 30 in Barcelona (distracted whilst crossing the street, no doubt), and medical help was delayed because they assumed the badly dressed old man was merely an anonymous beggar. He might have lived a few more years had they called a decent doctor immediately. Second, the idea is to finish the major construction of La Sagrada Familia by next year, the 100th anniversary of the architect’s death and they seem to be on track to do so.]

A different vision for everyone!

If I gave ten people the same camera and asked them to take pictures of La Sagrada Familia I would almost certainly get ten completely different perspectives of this famous church. Some might choose to photograph the tourists wandering about taking selfies, others may choose to shoot straight up at the ceiling, others might process everything in monochrome, or in exaggerated colors, and still others may choose to look for abstract patterns, or shoot exteriors at night.

The point is, we all have an individual vision… a way we personally see the world. As long as we do not fall into the trap of copying what others have done, that vision should naturally seep out and ooze into your photographs. There is a Colorado photographer whose work I admire, Cole Thompson, and he deliberately does not look at the work of other photographers when he travels somewhere for a photo project–he does not want his vision contaminated with conscious, or even subconscience, imitation. Interesting idea, me thinks.

The Goal

I have been to La Sagrada Familia multiple times and have hundreds of photographs of it, both inside and out, color and B&W. And… I have seen thousands of photographs by other photogs of the building both online and in books–so my visual perspective has certainly been warped, or “contaminated” as Cole might say.

So, would it be possible to trudge once more over to the Basílica i Temple Expiatori and find a more personal way of seeing things? With this very familiar subject, could I refine my photographic vision even more?

That was my goal. So upon arrival I just tried to relax and really pay attention to what my eye was instinctively attracted to.

Within a few minutes it dawned on my that I really liked picking out smaller details or sections of the church, rather than going for pictures of the whole enchilada (tempting as that might be). That, and following the light beaming and glowing on to these details as the late, low, autumn sun slowly moved down the face of the western stained glass panels.

The Parameters

Once I had my photo essay “idea”, or topic in mind, it naturally led to accepting the following parameters for my images:

–All shot with the my Nikon D850 with the Nikkor f/4 70-200mm zoom lens (telephoto effect to isolate details). Image quality and dynamic range with the D850 are superb, and the size of the files make it possible to print large if that opportunity were to arise.

–Since I was hand holding the camera, shoot at ISO 1600 and worry about eliminating noise in post-processing.

–Either vertical or horizontal but all with the same aspect ratio (3:2).

–All in color (despite my propensity to prefer B&W). Too much color within the sanctuary, both subtle and obvious, to ignore it.

–Try to create as many images as possible that border on abstraction.

–Confine my shots to the interior of the temple.

–No people in the shots.

–Key: Try to discover unique compositions, hidden in the recesses of the building.

I am not sure I was 100% successful, but I did notice that what I produced was different from any of my images from previous visits to La Sagrada Familia. Perhaps I am slowly moving toward a more honest personal vision?