IN STEREO

The Spaniards arrived in Potosí at the end of the Renaissance. In fact, that’s why we barely have two Renaissance churches in Potosí; we don’t have any more. Later on, what it is known as Baroque architecture would fully emerge, [but] with a fundamental difference in comparison to the European style. Our Baroque was fused with decorative elements: of animals, of plants, grapes, monkeys, mermaids – things that don’t exist in the European baroque. From there, the term ‘Mestizo Baroque’ was coined. Mining, the age of silver, brought the Mestizo Baroque with all its force – the doorway of San Lorenzo is an example of this. In that mining boom, all the workers of the mountain were Indians.

The carving that was made for the doorway of San Lorenzo is nothing more than the survival of – or the union of – two cultures: the European with Indian, with the pre-Hispanic. The Mestizo Baroque, all generated by the Potosínian silver: in architecture, in civil construction, in music. Mestizo Baroque is found all around; it is the strongest essence. Potosí is perhaps the most important city of the Mestizo Baroque. As a result of that – the influence on art, the influence on the industrial age in Europe, the economic contribution that has been made to human society so that we reach this moment – in the year 1987, UNESCO accepted us for all the history, the history the architecture represents. – Tourism & Heritage Official