About "Hybrid Andean Baroque": the main studies on the decoration of religious architecture façades in the Andes between the 17th and 18th centuries

• Grant number: 22/08904-5
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: October 01, 2022
• End date: September 30, 2023
• Field of knowledge: Applied Social Sciences - Architecture and Town Planning - Fundamentals of Architecture and Urbanism
• Principal Investigator: Renata Maria de Almeida Martins
• Grantee: Ryan Mulatinho da Silva
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Arquitetura e Urbanismo (FAU). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Associated research grant: 21/06538-9 - Baroque-açu: Portuguese America in the art geography of the global South, AP.JP2

Abstract

This scientific initiation project aims to produce a survey of the main historiographical studies on the decoration of facades in religious architecture in the Andes during the 17th and 18th centuries. The process of Spanish colonization in Andean America brought European models and repertoires to the artistic and architectural production in the region, however, andean ancestral conceptions have been given new meaning, especially in the façades, giving rise to a baroque of hybrid characteristics. This was characterized, above all, by the development of decorations full of elements referring to the American fauna and flora, in addition to the adoption of codes present in pre-Columbian traditions, linked, for example, to the sophisticated textile production; to the elaboration of pigments from plants, with natural and symbolic properties (SIRACUSANO, 2005); besides the exquisite work with stone (GASPARINI, 2015). In addition, grotesque motifs and elements of European emblematic culture also begin to circulate in objects of Andean tradition, as in the quero or qero cups (CUMMINS, 2002), or in women's ceremonial lillac robes and men's robes, uncus (PHIPPS, 2018). Given the multiplicity of information contained in these architectures, and the transdisciplinary perspectives involved (archaeology, anthropology, material culture, social history, etc.), Andean facades are therefore a means of historical record of the re-existence of local Amerindian cultures in the face of the cultural ruptures and clashes brought about by the colonization process. The study of the decorative particularities present on these facades has marked a strong and important Latin American historiographic tradition (GUIDO, 1925; MESA, GISBERT, 1966; HARTH-TERRE, 1974; GISBERT, 2001, 2008; GUTIÉRREZ, 1997; MUJICA PINILLA, 2002), propitiating debates on mestizaje, interculturality, and transculturation, still of international interest (GONZÁLEZ, MARANGUELLO, 2016; COHEN-APONTE, 2017). Such a theme allows to deepen a field still little explored in Brazilian historiography (MARTINS, 2013, 2015), unraveling the layers of structuring present in the physical and cosmological composition of the works of a "Hybrid Andean Baroque" (BAILEY, 2010), with different resonances in South America, and in its artistic geography. This research, therefore, also intends to collaborate directly with the objectives of the Young Researcher Project phase 2 funded by FAPESP at FAUUSP, entitled " Baroque-Açu. Portuguese America in the Artistic Geography of the Global South".