Pre-modern brutalism

No photos!!@%$
The entrance to the basilica and a view of the main altar.
I tried to show how it reminds me of the modern architectural school of concrete brutalism, but also how the balance of the side chapels soften the effect to something inconspicuous.
In the Virgen de xyz they even did away with everything except the statue.
The church is organized as a Greek cross within a square, and this main area was inspired by Michelangelo’s St Peter’s Basilica, but with the original apses squared in the manner of Alessi’s S Maria Assunta in Carignano, Genoa.
Everything is much wider than other churches and this serves to set off the height of the altar, which is about ten feet in the air. The building seems higher because the cupola is housed above a cylinderical drum. These factors make it seem like everything is normal size, its you that is small.
Fuzzy close up of the main altar was taken from the kings bedchamber before anybody realised the door into the church was open! The king and queens 3 room apartments are tiny by their standards. The bed chamber is the size of 2 or maybe 3 double beds. But the really amazing thing is that he can lie in bed and by turning his head to the left can see through the door into the high altar and by turning it to the right can see into his garden. And the reverse for the queen's chambers on the other side.
Philip was known as an austere and difficult to please man but his grip on the decorators of the place and his small, comfortable and practical apartments suggest another character. I'll put him on the list of people to have dinner with.
I'd still like to know why the Hieronymite Order was expelled (like the Jesuits,) from Spain three times (in 1808, 1837 and 1854) and finally replaced in 1885 by the Augustinians, who are still there.Read more