Spanish Colonial architecture

“ The sixty years of the Spanish captivity, as it was called, from 1580 to 1640, were naturally comparatively barren of all good work. After the restoration of peace and a revival of the Brazilian trade had brought back some of the wealth which the country had lost, the art of building had fallen so low that of the many churches rebuilt or altered during the eighteenth century there is scarcely one possessed of the slightest merit. ”

“ At the end of the 17th and first half of the 18th century, the Baroque or Churrigueresque architecture had such influence over furniture, that although exaggerated examples were very common, they reached in no country to such a pitch as they did in Spain. As specimens, the enormous retablos over the high altars made of gilt carved wood may be mentioned, which are so frequently to be seen in Spanish churches. The exuberance of uncouth heavy ornamentation destroys the regularity and harmony of the general effect. ”

“ I need hardly say that in these days none of us err on this side, and that in truth our buildings only too often lack even that amount of solidity which is necessary to their stability. And this leads me naturally to another questionable feature in modern work, which is to a great extent the cause of our failing in the matter of solidity. These noble Spanish buildings were usually solid and simple; their mouldings were not very many, and their sculptures were few, precious, and delicate. ”

“ Spanish architecture, however modern it may be, sometimes adds to that impression and one might believe himself, with little stretch of the imagination, to be in one of the ancient cities of the old world.
The streets are paved with blocks of granite and other stone, roughly cut and consequently exceedingly noisy, but upon these narrow streets front some shops as fine as one might expect to discover in New York or Paris. It is true that they are not large, but they do not need to be, for nearly all are devoted to specialties, instead of carrying stocks of goods of the American diversity. ”

“ This influence had already been felt in the Spanish flamboyant Gothic panelling and tracery; when translated into Renaissance, and probably, at first, executed by Italian artists, it displayed a variety and beauty in its design scarcely inferior to some of the best work in Italy. And this development, taking place at a time when Spain was overflowing with wealth, resulted in that exuberant richness we find in the entrance doorways and windows, the external galleries of the upper storey, and the rich cresting surmounting the cornice. ”

“ The fully developed Middle Pointed or Geometrical Gothic is indeed very uniform all over Europe. Here, however, its efforts were neither grand in scale nor interesting. Some of the church furniture, as, e.g. the choir screens at Toledo, and some of the cloisters, are among the best features. The work is all correct, tame and academical, and has none of the dignity, power and interest which marked the earlier Spanish buildings. Towards the end of the 14th century the work of Spanish architects becomes infinitely more interesting. ”

“ If the stalls at Santa Cruz are the only examples of this period still left on the mainland, the Sé Velha possesses the only great mediæval reredos. In Spain great structures are found in almost every cathedral rising above the altar to the vault in tier upon tier of niche and panel. Richly gilded, with fine paintings on the panels, with delicate Gothic pinnacles and tabernacle work, they and the metal screens which half hide them do much to make Spanish churches the most interesting in the world. ”

“ It is Spanish throughout, and contains few modern buildings of any importance. The atmosphere of bygone centuries hangs over it; time and the elements have imparted a richness to its walls that constitutes its only charm. It is like an old painting by a master hand, mellow and sedate. In the joints and cracks of its discoloured walls, creepers, weeds, and mosses find root-hold and nourishment. The buttresses, bastions, battlements, and sentry towers that strengthen and equip the ramparts, all give evidence of the important part the city was designed to play in the colonial system of Spain. ”

“ Spain produced painters whose works were to serve as among the greatest models of all time, and her attainments in other phases of art, if less inspiring, were of a distinguished order. Spanish architecture, though rarely approved by modern critics, was to become a force in the world through its transmission to the Americas. ”

“ The houses are mostly of stone, very lofty and tasteful, the streets broad and quite straight, crossing each other at right angles, which is a favourite method of building the towns of the Spanish dominions in the New World. The streets are generally very clean, and there is a fine square in the middle of the city, superior to the great square of Mexico, adorned with porticoes or piazzas on three of its sides, and on the fourth, by the great cathedral built of stone, with two lofty towers, and an elegant front of modern architecture. ”

“ Another evidence of the late character of the work is given by the arch mouldings, which die against and interpenetrate those of the columns, there being no capitals. Beyond a certain stateliness of height and colour which this small cathedral has in common with most other Spanish works of the same age, there is but little to detain or interest an architect. But stateliness and good effects of light and shade are so very rare in modern works, that we can ill afford to regard a building which shows them as being devoid of merit or interest. ”

“ Indeed, it is not possible to go very far in Spain without feeling either that Spanish architects seldom cared for the external effect of their buildings, or that whatever they did has been ruthlessly spoilt in later days. ”

“ It is still easy to discern what a tremendous amount of building must have gone on within the narrow city limits during the early part of its second erection. The streets are still full of bits of Romanesque architecture, palaces, arcades, houses, balconies, towers and windows and one of the finest groups of Romanesque churches in Spain. Of lesser sinew and greater age than San Salvador, they are now breathing their last. ”

“ It is amazing the way one comes upon a perfect gem of Spanish Renaissance architecture, in the wilds among fields of cactus. Sometimes there is not even a village in the vicinity. The inside of the 178 church, with its rather Moorish vaulted roof and its Italian frescoed walls would have been very lovely, but for the usual additions that characterize either the Spanish or the Mexican Romanism, of which I have already complained. ”

“ To one who is unfamiliar with the distinctive peculiarities of Spanish-American architecture, nothing, at first, is more surprising than the contrast between the gloomy and unpromising exterior of a Cuban residence and the luxury and architectural beauty which one often finds hidden behind its grated windows and thick stuccoed walls. It is more surprising and striking in Santiago, perhaps, than in most Spanish-American cities, on account of the narrowness and filthiness of the streets on which the houses even of the wealthiest citizens stand. ”

“ Few countries in Europe, and assuredly none in America, are richer in fine old edifices than Mexico, and they are of various types, the penitentiary of Puebla, for example, recalling some French châteaux, or Scottish castles of the Middle Ages, when building in both France and Scotland was largely carried on by Flemings. Needless to say, architecture of an inherently Spanish character is paramount in Mexico, not merely because of her inheritance, but because, in her early years, many of her great ecclesiastical structures were wrought from designs sent from Spain. ”

“ Apparently the Spanish and the American civilization is merely a gloss over their ancient life which they seek every opportunity to express. They are to-day practically non-assimilative and live to a large extent their own life in their own way, although they have adopted a few of the American customs. While quite a large number of these villages are now to be seen very much in their primitive style of architecture and life, more than 3,000 architectural ruins in the Southwest, chiefly in Arizona and New Mexico, have been discovered. ”

“ No;{15} a complete, evolutionary study of Spanish architecture would imply years of labour, of travel, and of study. For so much on the peninsula is hybrid and exotic, and yet again, so much is peculiar to Spain alone. Thus it is often most difficult to determine which art phenomena are natural—that is, which are the logical results of a well-defined art movement—and which are artificial or the casual product of elements utterly foreign to Spanish soil. ”

“ This, at any rate, is certain: the first architect of Toledo, whether he were French or Spanish, was thoroughly well acquainted with the best French churches, and could not otherwise have done what he did. In Spain itself there was, as I have said before, nothing to lead gradually to the full development of the pointed style. We find, on the contrary, buildings, planned evidently by foreign hands, rising suddenly, without any connexion with other buildings in their own district, and yet with most obvious features of similarity to works in other countries erected just before them. ”

“ No one stays within doors on Sunday in Madrid, and all Europe loves the out-door sunshine.
We have said that the Spanish capital was deficient in buildings of architectural pretension. This is quite true; but the country is rich in the character of her monuments, possessing one order of architecture elsewhere little known. Our guide called it very appropriately the Morisco style, which has grown out of the combination of Moorish and Christian art. The former attained, during the Middle Ages, as great importance in Spain as in the East. ”

“ Granada was soon resurrected as a Greek-Roman "Centralbau" and even the crossing of Gothic Burgos was unfortunately restored by Borgoña after classic models.
The new foreign movement found expression in architecture, in sculpture and in painting, often with the most extraordinary attempts to employ the new without discarding the old. Grotesque and fantastic ornaments crown illogical construction.
The royal chapel, the chapter house, the sagrario and the great sacristy are examples of the new-born style. The first two are magnificent specimens of Spanish Renaissance. ”

“ Large, costly, and often elegant stone edifices—public and private—are not wanting in the principal towns and cities of Mexico; but all, save those of very recent construction, have the characteristic Saracenic or Moorish architecture of Southern Spain—namely, a rectangular structure with rooms opening on to interior piazzas, and a more or less spacious court-yard, which is often fancifully paved and ornamented with fountains and shrubbery ”

“ The scale on which they are built is magnificent, and their walls still stand almost untouched by the ages of neglect from which they have suffered. In the same way the walls which encircle the Spanish cities are often still so perfect throughout their circuit that it is almost possible to persuade oneself that they have been untouched for three hundred years. Avila, Lugo, Segovia, Toledo, Pamplona, Astorga, Gerona, Tarragona, and many other towns are girt round with so close an array of tower and wall as to make them still look fit for defence. ”

“ Marble and alabaster are treated like metal and lace; beauty is sought in details and no longer in grand and simple lines. To the Spanish Saracens belongs the invention of a dwelling combining with convenience and suitability to their climate a high degree of beauty. Nowhere else has a fortress been made a home of strength and beauty like the Alhambra (mainly fourteenth century) and the other alcazars of Spain. The semi-oriental domestic architecture adopted by the Christians of Andalusia is seen at its best in the so-called Casa de Pilatos at Seville (1521) . ”

“ The survey of Spanish art in the fifteenth century is, I think, on the whole, more gratifying than it is in the fourteenth. In the earliest churches, as the models from which they were derived were first of all built in hot climates, the windows were small and few, the walls thick, the roofs flat-pitched, and the whole construction eminently suited to the physical circumstances of the country. ”

“ They were built for the honour of God, but also for the enjoyment of the people themselves; religion was joyful, popular—democratic, one might say. All the exuberant life garnered by Hispano-Arab culture lives in the Spanish buildings. Here Roman, Byzantine, and Arab art have passed, and also the Mudejar, the Gothic, and the Renaissance—in fact, all the styles of Europe. For this reason there is no native school of architecture. Spain possesses few p. ”

“ In England we have hardly a single attempt at anything of the kind, though in Ireland, in St. Cormack’s Chapel at Cashel, we not only have an example, but one also that proves to us that we may build in this solid fashion, so that our work may endure in extraordinary perfection come what may—as it has there—of neglect, of desolation, and of desecration! Yet of all the virtues of good architecture none are greater than solidity and permanence, and we in England cannot therefore afford to affect any of our Insular airs of superiority over these old Spanish artists! ”

“ The admirable work of the carved balconies and shutters, the iron-work and carved stone-work cannot fail to make every one admire houses which are rapidly becoming unique. The Spaniards have, alas! like many other nations, lost their taste in architecture, and the modern houses which are springing up all too quickly make one [22] shudder to contemplate. Some had been built to replace those which had been burnt, others were merely being built by men who had made a fortune in the banana trade. ”