158- Identity: the
building blocks of
2. Literature
and philosophy
3. Art and
architecture
4. Performing
arts
5. Cinema
and fashion
6. Media and
communications
7. Food and drink 8. Living culture:
the details of
Enough of the high spirits: Neoclassicism
At the end of the 18thcentury, Spanish architecture
followed the rest of Europe and sought out something
more rational, something more grown up.
Neoclassicism stepped earnestly forth, convinced
that copying the ancients was the only route to honest
architecture. Its influence was relatively limited,
confined largely to a few
royally commissioned
buildings embroiled in
Carlos III’s plan to
gentrify Madrid. Juan de
Villanueva was the big
architect, and the
Museo Prado his big
project, initiated in 1785
but only opened three
decades later. It made
use of classical motifs in
the manner of Baroque
but the Prado’s
regimented columns are
unadorned, used in the
pure no-nonsense style
of the Ancients. He also
built villas at El Escorial
to house the King’s buddies on hunting weekends.
The other name of Neoclassical Spain was Ventura
Rodríguez, the bricklayer’s son responsible for the bland
façade of Pamplona cathedral. His revamp of Zaragoza’s
Pilar Basilica was more exciting – he realised that what
the building needed was 11 cupolas and four minarets
on the roof.Valladolid university
The façade here is
typical of Spanish
Baroque’s taste for a
fancy doorway.
Santiago de
Compostela cathedral
Another façade; this one
the highpoint of Spain’s
own Baroque adventure,
Churrigueresque.
Palacio Real
Madrid’s vast royal pad
shows how Spanish
secular building in the
Baroque period followed
French models.
Three Baroque
wonders
of Spain