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date: 11 February 2025

Mexican Monastic Architecturelocked

Mexican Monastic Architecturelocked

  • Niccolò BrookerNiccolò BrookerIndependent Scholar

Summary

Mexico’s 16th-century monasteries, or conventos, occupy a singular place in history. These immense, often complex assemblages of buildings within vast compounds are the first architectural expressions resulting from the great contact between Europe and the New World, that is, between the zealous Spanish friars who conceived them and the extensive Amerindian workforce which constructed them. Reflective to a degree of their European predecessors, the Mexican conventos represented adaptations to unique religious circumstances and, as a result, introduced original architectural adjuncts, the most significant of which was the open chapel, or capilla abierta. Catering to large-scale, outdoor religious ceremonies to which the Amerindians were accustomed, these chapels were instrumental in the conversion of millions of indigenous from pre-Cortesian paganism to Christian monotheism.

Subjects

  • Christianity
  • Religion and Art
  • Religion in America

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