Spanish Baroque ephemeral architecture

Ephemeral architecture had a special relevance in the Spanish Baroque, as it fulfilled diverse aesthetic, political, religious and social functions. On the one hand, it was an indispensable component of support for architectural achievements, carried out in a perishable and transitory way, which allowed a cheapening of materials and a way to capture new designs and more daring and original solutions of the new Baroque style, which could not be done in conventional constructions. On the other hand, its volubility made possible the creation of a wide range of productions designed according to their diverse functionality: triumphal arches for the reception of kings and aristocratic personages, catafalques for religious ceremonies, burial mounds for funerary ceremonies and diverse scenarios for social or religious events, such as the feast of Corpus Christi or Holy Week.
These works were usually profusely decorated and developed an iconographic program that emphasized the power of the ruling classes of the time, both political and religious: in the political sphere it exalted the omnipotent power of the absolutist monarchy, while in the religious sphere it praised the spiritual dominion of the Counter-Reformation Church. They used to have a high propagandistic component, as vehicles of ostentation of these ruling classes, so they were mainly addressed to the people—that were the recipients of these grand ceremonies and spectacles.
Although there are no material remains of this type of performance, they are known thanks to drawings and engravings, as well as literary accounts of the time, which described them in great detail. Many writers and chroniclers devoted themselves to this type of descriptions, even giving rise to a new literary genre, the "Chronicle."
Architecture is the art and technique of constructing buildings, of designing spaces and volumes with a utilitarian purpose, mainly housing, but also various constructions of a social, civil or religious nature. Space, when modified by human beings, is transmuted, acquires a new meaning, a new perception, thus acquiring a cultural dimension, while taking on an aesthetic significance, as it is perceived in an intellectualized and artistic way, as an expression of socio-cultural values inherent to each people and culture. This aesthetic character can give the space an ephemeral component, as it is used in public acts and celebrations, rituals, festivals, markets, shows, religious ceremonies, official acts, political events, etc.
In the Baroque, the arts converged to create a total work of art, with a theatrical aesthetic, scenography, a mise-en-scène that highlighted the splendor of the dominant power (Church or State). The interaction of all the arts expressed the use of visual language as a means of mass communication, embodied in a dynamic conception of nature and surrounding space, in a culture of the image.
One of the main characteristics of Baroque art is its illusory and contrived character: "ingenuity and design are the magic art through which one manages to deceive the eye to the point of astonishment". The visual and ephemeral were especially valued, so the theater and the various genres of performing arts and shows were booming: dance, pantomime, musical drama (oratorio and melodrama), puppet shows, acrobatics, circuses, etc. There was a feeling that the world is a theater (theatrum mundi) and life a theatrical performance: "all the world is a stage, and all men and women mere actors" (As You Like It, William Shakespeare, 1599). Similarly there was a tendency to theatricalize the other arts, especially architecture. It was an art based on the inversion of reality: on "simulation", on turning the false into the true, and on "dissimulation", passing off the true as false. Things are not shown as they are, but as one would like them to be, especially in the Catholic world, where the Counter-Reformation had a meager success, since half of Europe turned to Protestantism. In literature, it manifested itself by giving free rein to rhetorical artifice, as a means of propagandistic expression in which the sumptuousness of language sought to reflect reality in a sweetened form, resorting to rhetorical figures such as metaphor, paradox, hyperbole, antithesis, hyperbaton, ellipsis, etc. This transposition of reality, which is distorted and magnified, altered in its proportions and subjected to the subjective criterion of fiction, was also applied to painting, where foreshortening and illusionist perspective are abused for the sake of greater, striking and surprising effects.
Baroque Art sought to create an alternative reality through fiction and illusion. This tendency had its maximum expression in festivity and playful celebration. Buildings such as churches or palaces, or a neighborhood or an entire city, became theaters of life, stages where reality and illusion were mixed, where the senses were subjected to deception and artifice. In this aspect, the Counter-Reformation Church played a special role, seeking to show its superiority over the Protestant churches through pomp and pageantry, with events such as solemn Mass, canonizations, Jubilees, processions or papal investitures. But just as lavish were the celebrations of the monarchy and the aristocracy, with events such as coronations, royal weddings and births, funerals, military victories, ambassadorial visits or any event that allowed the monarch to display his power to the admiration of the people. Baroque festivities involved a conjugation of all the arts, from architecture and plastic arts to poetry, music, dance, theater, pyrotechnics, floral arrangements, water games, etc. Architects such as Bernini or Pietro da Cortona, or Alonso Cano and Sebastián Herrera Barnuevo in Spain, contributed their talent to such events, designing structures, choreographies, lighting and other elements, which often served as a testing ground for future, more serious endeavors.
During the Baroque, the ornamental, contrived and ornate character of the art of this time conveyed a transitory sense of life, related to the memento mori, the ephemeral value of riches in the face of the inevitability of death, in parallel to the pictorial genre of the vanitas. This sentiment led to a vitalist appreciation of the fleetingness of the instant, to enjoy the light moments of relaxation that life offers, or the celebrations and solemn acts. Thus, births, weddings, deaths, religious ceremonies, royal coronations and other recreational or ceremonial events, were invested with a pomp and artifice of a scenographic nature, where large assemblies were developed that brought together architecture and decorations to provide an eloquent magnificence to any celebration, which became a show almost catartic, where the illusory element, the attenuation of the border between reality and fantasy, was especially relevant.
In Spain, the architecture of the first half of the 17th century showed the herrerian architecture heritage, with an austerity and geometric simplicity influenced by escurialense style. The Baroque was gradually introduced, especially in the ornate interior decoration of churches and palaces, where the retables evolved towards ever higher levels of magnificence. In this period it was Juan Gómez de Mora the most outstanding figure, with achievements such as La Clerecía of Salamanca (1617), the Casa de la Villa (1644–1702) and the Plaza Mayor (1617–1619). Other architects of the period were Alonso Carbonel, author of the Buen Retiro Palace (1630–1640), or Pedro Sánchez and Francisco Bautista, authors of the Collegiate church of San Isidro (1620–1664).
Towards the middle of the century, richer forms and freer and more dynamic volumes were gaining ground, with naturalistic decorations (garlands, vegetal cartouches) or abstract forms (moldings and trimmed baquetons, generally of mixtilinear form). The names of Pedro de la Torre, José de Villarreal, José del Olmo, Sebastián Herrera Barnuevo and, especially, Alonso Cano, author of the façade of the Cathedral of Granada (1667) should be mentioned.
Between the end of the century and the beginning of the 18th century, the churrigueresque style (by the Churriguera brothers) appeared, characterized by its exuberant decorativism and the use of Solomonic columns: José Benito Churriguera was the author of the High Altarpiece of Convento de San Esteban (1692) and the facade of the Goyeneche Palace (1709–1722); Alberto Churriguera designed the Plaza Mayor of Salamanca (1728–1735); and Joaquín Churriguera was the author of the Colegio de Calatrava (1717) and the cloister of San Bartolomé (1715) in Salamanca, of plateresque influence. Other figures of the period were: Teodoro Ardemans, author of the facade of the Madrid City Hall and the first project for the Royal Palace of La Granja de San Ildefonso (1718–1726); Pedro de Ribera, author of the Bridge of Toledo (1718–1732), the Cuartel del Conde-Duque (1717) and the facade of the Our Lady of Montserrat Church in Madrid (1720); Narciso Tomé, author El Transparente (1721–1734); the German Konrad Rudolf, author of the façade of the Valencia Cathedral (1703); Jaime Bort, architect of the façade of the Murcia Cathedral (1736–1753); Vicente Acero, who designed the Cádiz Cathedral (1722–1762); and Fernando de Casas Novoa, author of the facade of the obradoiro of the Santiago de Compostela Cathedral (1739–1750).
The splendor of ephemeral architecture was produced in the Early modern period, in the Renaissance and—especially—the Baroque, eras of consolidation of the absolute monarchy, when European monarchs sought to elevate their figure above that of their subjects, resorting to all kinds of propagandistic and exalting acts of their power, in political and religious ceremonies or celebrations of playful character, which showed the magnificence of their government.
Although this period was one of a certain political and economic decadence, in the cultural sphere it was one of great splendor—the so-called Spanish Golden Age—with a magnificent flowering of literature and the arts. On the other hand, although in the political field the monarchy was resolutely authoritarian, the way of governing showed a strong populist component; while in the religious field, strict faith was combined with a realistic and critical vision of the world. These elements contributed to the desire for an art close to the people, which would easily and directly show the moral and ideological aspects that the ruling classes wanted to transmit to their subjects. Thus, according to the historian José Antonio Maravall, Baroque art and culture was "directed", since its objective was communication; "massive", since it was aimed at the people; and "conservative", since it sought to perpetuate traditional values.
These distractions helped the populace to cope with their hardships: according to Jerónimo de Barrionuevo, "bien son menester estos divertimentos para poder llevar tantas adversidades." (English: "these diversions are necessary to be able to bear so many adversities.") This evasion of reality leads Antonio Bonet Correa to describe this period as "utopian space and time", since it is only a temporary relief from the harsh reality of the majority of the population, submerged in misery.
Ephemeral architecture was generally made with poor and perishable materials, such as wood, cardboard, cloth, stucco, cane, paper, grey-leaved cistus, lime or scagliola, which were nevertheless enhanced by the monumentality of the works and by their original and fanciful designs, as well as by the sumptuousness of the ornamental decoration. These were works in which architecture, sculpture, painting and the decorative arts all took part, and where scenography was especially important. It could be performed both inside buildings—generally religious temples—and in the streets of towns and cities, through numerous constructive typologies, such as triumphal arches, castles, porticos, tempiettos, catafalques, pavilions, galleries, colonnades, loggias, aediculae, pyramids, obelisks, pedestals, baldachins, fly systems, altars, dossals, etc. Sculptures, tapestries, canvases and paintings were also relevant; the latter often represented feigned architectures or landscapes, being common the representation of "parnassuss", mountains with vegetation, rivers and fountains in which gods, muses and historical characters were depicted. Other decorative elements were floral tapestries, garlands, cornucopias, mirrors, candelabras, shields, and flags. In addition to all this, we must take into account mobile elements such as carriages or processions, retinues and retinues, masquerades, mojigangas, juegos de cañas and auto-da-fé, as well as other elements such as fireworks, bullfights, naumachias, jousting and mock war, music, dance, theater and other genres of spectacle.
Perhaps the most emblematic element of Baroque ephemeral architecture was the funeral tumulus, since it signified more than any other the conception of the transitory, the transience of life, which translates into the transience of the party, of the ephemeral celebration. The funeral pomps represent, as well as the ephemeral architecture, the chance, the emptiness, the fleeting of the existence, opposing the corporeal temporality to the immortality of the soul. For this reason, references to death are frequent in the decoration of burial mounds and catafalques, through skeletons, skulls, hourglasses, candles and other elements alluding to the end of human existence. The typological evolution of the burial mounds derived from the monument-type catafalques inherited from mannerist Renaissance to the pyre-type catafalques of the full Baroque, with a turriform plan and domed temple, deriving towards the end of the Baroque into baldachin-type catafalques; by the end of the 18th century they would evolve into the obelisk-type catafalque, of neoclassical style. Burial mounds were reserved for the royal family, until 1696 when Charles II approved their opening to members of the aristocracy and the ecclesiastical hierarchy.
Many architects used ephemeral architecture as a test bed for original and bolder formulas and solutions than in conventional architecture, which they then tested in stable constructions, with the result that this modality helped powerfully in the progress of Spanish architecture. Some of the most renowned architects carried out this type of work, such as Juan Gómez de Mora, Pedro de la Torre, José Benito Churriguera, Alonso Cano, José del Olmo and Sebastián Herrera Barnuevo. Even renowned artists intervened in this type of work, such as El Greco, in the design of the tomb of Margaret of Austria-Styria (1612); Rubens, in the entrance of the cardinal-infante Ferdinand of Austria at Antwerp in 1635; Velázquez, in the decoration of the betrothal of Louis XIV and Maria Theresa of Spain, at Pheasant Island (1660); or Murillo, in the celebration of the Immaculate Conception in Seville (1665).
Any event was suitable for the ephemeral celebration: the monarchs celebrated in a lavish way every relevant event in their lives, such as births, baptisms, onomastics, weddings, enthronement ceremonies, visits to cities, military victories, diplomatic agreements, funerals, etc. As for religious celebrations, those of Corpus Christi and Holy Week, celebrated with processions, via crucis, rogativas, autos sacramentales, where large stage sets were usually set up for the festivities, and along with the religious processions, folkloric elements such as masks, mojigones, fanfares, giants and big-heads were added. Also part of the ephemeral celebrations were the so-called "Holy Week Monuments" that were mounted with great pomposity inside temples and churches—the case of the Cathedral of Seville is the most paradigmatic example in the Baroque period. Other celebrations were motivated by specific acts, generally canonizations, such as those of Louis Bertrand in 1608, Francisco Xavier, Ignatius of Loyola, Isidore the Laborer and Teresa of Ávila in 1622, Tomás de Villanueva in 1658, Francis Borgia in 1671 or Paschal Baylón in 1690; or pontifical decrees, such as the brief of Alexander VII in which he recognized the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin (1662). Of particular significance was the canonization of Ferdinand III in 1671, since it brought together Church and monarchy in the same interest, combining the values of the ruling classes of the Ancien Régime.
The patronage of the monarchy and the Church entailed a certain support to professionals of architecture, plastic and decorative arts and craftsmanship, who thus counted on labor commissions in a time of economic crisis in which there was scarce work at the civil level. On the other hand, ephemeral architecture reached a level of popularity that gave great prestige to the professional who carried it out. Thus the competition held for the awarding of the obsequies of Marie Louise d'Orléans in 1689, won by a previously unknown José Benito de Churriguera, served the latter to launch his professional career with great success.
There are no material remains of these ephemeral events, and they are only known through engravings and drawings, and written accounts that described in detail all the details of these celebrations. Such accounts gave rise to a new literary genre, that of the "chronicle", which have as their main reference point Juan Calvete de Estrella, author of El túmulo Imperial, adornado de historias y letreros y epitaphios en prosa y verso latino (1559). This literature abounded in meticulous descriptions of the events celebrated by the monarchy and the Church, with special emphasis on symbolic elements, often embodied in hieroglyphs and shields, whose mottos, generally in Latin, they translated into Spanish in verse. On the other hand, these chronicles did not fail to reveal the political, social and moral values that the powerful personages who sponsored these lavish events were championing.
In the 18th century, the same festive typologies continued, as the Bourbons maintained the same protocols and repertoires of celebrations and solemnities. The evolution in ephemeral architectures was mainly stylistic, especially from the first third of the century, when the encouragement of the Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando promoted the classicist lines, in a movement that would be baptized as neoclassicism. On the other hand, the rise of the Enlightenment led to a decrease in the number of large-scale religious festivities of a counter-reformist nature. The new events had a more didactic character, with a clearer distinction between the sacred and the profane, and music and opera became more important.