In 1957 Jane Owen met with project collaborators in her daughter Janie’s New York apartment. The project was the celebrated Roofless Church to be built in New Harmony, Indiana, and the collaborators were architect Philip Johnson and sculptor Jacques Lipchitz. Together the group brainstormed an east entrance to the walled grounds of a Roofless Church that would open onto a garden and sculpture courtyard. The path would lead to a wooden shrine protecting Lipchitz’s Notre Dame de Liesse: the sculpture that initially inspired the project.

Jane Owen’s idea was to commission a ceremonial processional gate for the open-air church, incorporating sculptures by Lipchitz. The cubist/brutalist sculptor created gates full of symbolism in bold gold against a backdrop of stark black-painted steel. At the peak of the gates, two gilded bronze angels hold a wreath with the Lamb of God at its center. Adorning the gates are four additional gold wreaths: two sets of Alpha and Omega symbols incorporated into the design. In Judaeo Christian symbology, the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet signify the comprehensiveness of God. When closed, the gates’ dark steel beams form a Latin cross.

Named in honor of Jane Owen’s family friend and governess, the Suzanne Glemét Gates were dedicated in New Harmony on May 31, 1962. The Reverend Sir George MacLeod, founder of the Iona Community in Scotland, presided. In 2016, artist Luke Randall painstakingly re-gilded the relief sculptures of the gates during a 200-hour project. The renovation was initiated and funded by Jane Owen’s son-in-law, Jimmy Coleman in her honor.

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