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San Diego & Quito Basilica del Voto Nacional - Thursday, April 3, 2008
San DiegoIt is a church and a monastery constructed inside Quito's colonial downtown, on request of the villagers of San Diego in 1559 and was finished in 1625, after the renewed religious orders after the Trento?s council. Father Bartolome Rubio was de director of the construction. Is has only one nave, with a brick dome, strong walls and beautiful coffered. Its front door has got a cattail. The ensemble is complete with the monastery, formed with three cloisters, with half arcades supported by stone columns. The garden is the centre of the interest and communitarian activity.
Inside the church are wall paintings of Santa Teresa, with rich colonial frames. The pulpit was carved by Juan Bautista Menacho in the 17th century. The portrait of Father Almeida and a Jesus sculpture are part of this church. The sculpture is very curious because when the person changes the angle from which he is looking. So was born the legend of Father Almeida.
Capilla de Chiquinquirá
It worked at the entrance of the San Diego Convent, next to the church. It was built inside Quito's colonial downtown, between 1797 and 1803, and then it was renewal in 1980. Inner the chapel there is a wall in which is represented the Virgen. It is said that this wall had been moved in procession in 1616. The painting of Fray Pedro Gosseal, Miracle, apparition and entrance of this painting to this chapel of the Pichincha?s crest, is the testimony of this procession.
San Juan
It is located in a strategic place of the Quito, because it can be seen from different parts of the Quito. The construction inside Quito's colonial downtown began at the end of the 16th century and beginning of the 17th century. The purpose of the construction was to form an Augustinian recollect.
It only has one nave, with a great rosette in its facade. The principal cloister has got round arches, its walls are from fetter and mud. It is covered by curved roof tile. It also has got a central garden with a gallery of round arches and columns of brick. The cloister it self is at the back next to another garden. It has one of the eldest cemeteries in the Quito.
La Basílica del Voto Nacional
It is one of the most impressing temples inside Quito's colonial downtowny, the last that was constructed, and the biggest church of this style in Latin America. The name remembers Ecuador?s consecration to Corazon de Jesús made by García Moreno.
It has a central nave and two lateral. It is made in stone, bonze an Italian marble by the architect Emile Tailler (1883-1892). He chose the gothic style, inspired in the Cathedral of Bourges of Paris, and because of receiving financing from the congregation of the Sacred Jesus Heart of France.
It has a neo-gothic style, combined with the French art and the traditional one. Example of this are the mythic animals carved in stone, representing Ecuador?s regions ant its fauna. Inner the church there are chapels dedicated to Ecuador?s provinces, besides of the National Pantheon for the Presidents.
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- Thursday, April 3, 2008 at 9:22 AM