This former Carthusian monastery merits a visit for its riotous Baroque church.
A 30-minute walk from the centre of town, the Monasterio de la Cartuja was a construction project plagued with problems. The building was commenced in the early 16th century but not completely finished until the monks were booted out by the Disentailment Act of 1835. Walking around the cloister you can sense the austere hard-working, contemplative lives of the ‘white robes’, and the vaulted chapterhouse features paintings of historical persecutions inflicted on the monks. All of which adds to the contrast that awaits when entering the church, which is a dazzling array of the colourful and the flamboyant.
The nave is divided into three sections: one for the public, one for the lay-brothers, and one for the monks. The last two were separated by an elaborate tortoiseshell door paned with Venetian glass; it’s placed in a Baroque screen decorated with canvases by Sánchez Cotón, just two of many fine paintings in here. The choir stalls have beautiful mouldings around them, while the walls in general are covered with polychrome plasterwork. A gilt baldachin sits over the altar and features the Assumption of the Virgin; above is a cupola with well-rendered cherubs peering down on the bewildered visitor. Behind it, a glassed arch leads to the Sanctuary Chapel. The dome and walls are painted by Palomino, who also did much work in Córdoba’s cathedral, but the room is dominated by an immense tabernacle in the centre. The whole is a gilt and marble fantasy, executed to perfection, and, once in here, it’s decision time: love it or hate it. After this, no visitor could possibly have mixed feelings about Spanish Baroque.
The sacristy is also exceptionally ornamental, but here the straight line has been eschewed, giving the extraordinary sensation that the room is melting, a feeling partly brought about by the unusual Alpujarran marble, which has streaks of colour that make it look like an exotic chocolate cocktail. There are a pair of sculptures of St Bruno, one of the founders of the Carthusian order, and an 18th-century painted dome.
