Iglesia de San Juan de la Palma - Seville

Built, like so many others in the historic center of the city, on the site of a former mosque, its construction features show that it is part of the large group of Early Gothic-Mudejar churches in Seville, although in this case it is a temple which has been greatly modified , both internally and externally, by the various expansions and reforms carried out over the centuries, to the extent that part of its original appearance and structure has been altered, of which only the Mudejar vault of the Sacrament Chapel and an interesting Gothic door at the base remains.

The most important renovations and extensions concerned mainly the main chapel, which was rebuilt at the beginning of the 16th century , when a new altar was installed at the request of Melchor Maldonado, ambassador of the Catholic Monarchs in Rome, who died in this chapel in 1504 and was buried. This chapel was demolished in 1710 due to dilapidation, as were the sacristy and the nave of the epistle, and as a result the foundation stone of the new main chapel was laid in 1719, in work led by the master builder of the archdiocese, Diego Antonio Díaz , which were completed in 1724.

Inside, it has the classic rectangular plan with three naves, separated by brick pillars and covered with wooden coffered ceilings, to which some side chapels were later added.

This church's slender bell tower, made of brick and finished in 1788 , as a tile on the front shows, consists of three sections; the first, practically blind, serves as support and height for the two upper sections in which the bells hang, two in the middle section and a smaller one in the upper section. In keeping with the Baroque aesthetic of the time, it is decorated with inlaid tiles with metal reflections and hemispheres, as well as pilasters covered with glazed blocks and the classical vases as pinnacles.

During the violent events of the Civil War in 1936, the church was severely damaged , burned and looted, although the statues of Jesús del Silencio, the Virgen de la Amargura and San Juan Evangelista, which had stood here since 1704, were saved.

In 1959 the current main altarpiece was installed, a work dating from the last third of the 18th century, coming from the church of San Felipe in the neighboring town of Carmona, replacing the previous altarpiece in this church, which had been transferred to San Juan de Aznalfarache.

Willem Vandenameele