Hospital de los venerables

Wed, 20 Sep 2006 14:51:49 +0000

HOSPITAL OF VENERABLES This is one of the most complete and best preserved monuments of the Spanish Baroque period. We can appreciate Sevillian Baroque architecture in its courts, galleries and church, decorated by Valdes Leal. It was founded in 1676 in the heart of the Santa Cruz district and it is a place not to miss in your visit to Seville.The church's fa?ade is in Jamerdana Street, but access to the building is from Plaza de Los Venerables, to a delightful carriage-entrance, leading directly to the central courtyard. The mixture of colours of the courtyard, where the whitewashed walls contrast with the red of the bricks of the rectangular columns, architraves and cornices, the first having very pronounced features, provide the whole area with enormous unity and a very characteristic colourful appearance.Architecturally, the church of the Hospital de Los Venerables, used nowadays as an Auditorium for which the splendid new organ was provided, follows the traditional style of church being built in Seville in the second half of the 17th c. That is to say, a rectangular floor plan, single walled nave, under half-barrel vaulting with lunettes and corresponding arches; the transept includes a half-dome with concave vault segments, no tambour or outer extrados, for the tiled roof consists of four slopes with skylights. Inside there are capitals in the shape of corbels.The entire church is painted - walls as well as roof - with countless figures by Valdes Leal and his son Lucas Valdes, no doubt encouraged by the canon, Justino de Neve, promoter of this whole undertaking. The idea was to restore moral authority to the Church and dignity to the hierarchy and to the clergy, the paintings on the ceiling of the Sacristy are outstanding in this sense. There is also a splendid chest of drawers in the Sacristy, used for storing the rich church vestments. The different objects of gold and silver owned by the institution should not be overlooked.

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Hospital de los venerables