Popayán is a city of big charms, beauty, conflicts and setbacks. Through all the epochs its history and the character of its inhabitants has been marked by this fate, confirmed by its economic cultural and political past, and the magnificence of its religious expressions.
The opening of new roads impelled, displaced and, still, appeased the opulence and the splendid beauty of this district; the scars of its beautiful architecture; the political shocks in which its warriors were committed and the physic commotions arisen in its ownland fluctuate from the gentle harmony of its country side, to the torrential versatility of its seasons; a coincident tri-ethnical culture converge with those of the pre-Columbian currents that inhabited the continent: the Quechua, together with the caravans of Spanish conquerors that entered to the valley through the South, another from the North, and a third one from the Caribbean sea through the Magdalena river were be latedly attracted by the ferocity and the be witchment of the region.
The natives that faced the first Spanish conquerors Juan de Ampudia and Pedro de Añasco, who arrived at the end of 1535 sent by Sebastian de Belalcazar to the region, were naked semi-nomads and hunters with incipient corn agriculture. These natives were refugees who lived in caves and huts or flaky conditioned trees, they came from Tierradentro, the country of the "nenga", daubed and using feathers tied to their forehead with lianas.
The aborigines escaped toward the North, pointing out the path that led them to a plentiful river of turbulent and sour waters of sulfurousscent that came down the mountain range and ran through the valley towardthe North. This river was baptized by the Yanaconas with the Quechua name of "Cauca". These same Spaniards, before continuing their trip toward the North, installed a camp in the outskirts which they named Villa de Ampudia.
Guided by the cross his lieutenants planted in the summit of the highest hill of the region - as they had agreed upon when they were in Quito– Captain Sebastian de Belalcázar arrived, coming from Quazábara where he was fighting a battle against an aboriginal confederation of approximately four thousand natives. In this place he remained a short time while recovering, and planning an expedition toward the Occident in charge of Juan de Ladrilleros who would try to look for a route to the Sea of the South, from where he entered inland to Peru with Don Francisco Pizarro. Belalcazar ordered Francisco García de Tobar to find a route to the Caribbean Sea through the eastern mountain range, to return to Spain to request the King the right to govern the regions he was discovering.
Belalcázar followed the Cauca river bed and in April 1536 and reached the expeditions of Juan de Ampudia in Jamundí. Joining their forces they both continued to the North along the fertile valley of the great river. In the place where today the city of Anserma is located Belalcázar received a message from Gaspar de Espinosa, the message said that Conqueror Francisco Pizarro, who suspected Belalcazar’s separatists intentions removed him of his position of Governor of Quito.
Without hesitating, Belalcázar undertook his return through Cartago. In Jamundí he left a crew in control of Lieutenant Miguel Muñoz with the order of founding the city of Cali. Later he arrived to the Villa de Ampudia in December 1536, where he found that his commissioners had already returned.
Captain Juan de Ladrilleros received him with a negative report, because he could not find the way to get to the Sea. There, Francisco García de Tobar told him about the Coconucos and Paletará indigenous groups, who said there was a big river running from the other slope of the mountain range toward the North where there was an abandoned culture of stone idols lost in the foot hill of a third mountain range. He said he named this place San Agustín.
Sensing that this was the yearned route for completing his plans, Belalcázar ordered his Lieutenant Juan de Ampudia, to stay there to transfer the village he had named as Villa de Ampudia to the foot of the hill where they had placed the before mentioned cross. The place he assigned was reclined in the mountain range and halfway of the valley of the Cauca river, of the Southern sea, of the Caribbean Sea, and of the Kingdom of Peru, to found a city that was to be called Popayán where he planned to install the headquarters of his domains, if his Majesty the King granted them to him.
The name was assumed from that of the cacique of the region of Pioyá which was pronounced Payán by the Yucatecos to which they added the Mayan voice -quiche-" Pop" or great Master, to indicate his hierarchy. Fifteen days later, on January 13, 1537, Juan de Ampudia carried out Belalcázar’s official order of founding Popayán, dedicating it to Our Lady of the Rest, as he was ordered.
Earthquakes In 1564 a fearful earthquake moved to the region and destroyed everything that was built until then except the temple of the Ermita which became Cathedral pro tempore in substitution of the regular one which had to be demolished. Nevertheless, of its ruins a new impulse, a creative energy arose, the first convents were built and the reconstruction of the second cathedral with tile and brick began. In February 1736, another earthquake occurred which shook Popayán so much or more violently than the one of 1564. Although seriously damaged, only some houses of more consistency such as the temple of La Ermita, La Torre del Reloj (the Watch Tower), part of the already built monasteries and the Seminario de la Compañía subsisted. Immediately the reconstruction began directed by the Town Council and partly financed by the Marquesa de San Miguel de la Vega and the opulent farmers that were succeeded by the commentators, whose off springs were educated in the Seminar of Popayán. Some of them traveled to Europe to complete their education, married ladies of the European nobility and carried out signal and powerful positions first in the Court and later in Popayan. The cultural conception and the level of life assumed by these youngsters, together with the socioeconomic structure of the moment in the Government of Popayán, and the enormous resources they brought from abroad resulted in the beautiful domestic architecture of the city.
The reconstruction was delayed until the end of the XVII century, due to the serial earthquakes that succeeded that of 1736, which forced to demolish some constructions they had built initially. So, frequent catastrophes woke up a panic feeling in the spirit of the payaneses. But Popayán came out ahead and during the decade of the 1980’s it became a remarkable intermediate city of Colombia, growing as acity of cultural and tourist high-level. A new earthquake on March 3l, 1983 hit Popayán again.
The national and international solidarity came in its help. The city conserved its political, managerial, and the cultural identity of its best days, as it is shown by the restoration of its colonial architecture and the reconstruction of all its collapsed houses and buildings. 32 new neighborhoods appeared (a marginal city to the historical one), partly integrated by families who emigrated to Popayán prior to the earthquake, which had grouped stacked in the small constructions of the suburbs.
The reconstruction was carried out together with the recovery of the economy and the dynamics of the city. Three scarce years were needed to place the foundations for the city’s development. Today Popayán is a city with 300 thousand inhabitants, citizens who are proud of their past and their experiences. The payaneses are hospitable people who feel sure of its destiny. These inhabitants are incorporated to modern life through their foreign and native youngsters that converge in schools and in the best Colombian universities that began to settled down in the city’s wide large houses soon after the earthquake. They came attracted by Popayán’s environmental and historical resources appropriate for the academic formation and by its facilities for the institutional managerial handling.
Popayán and its surroundings are attractive to national and international visitors because it is a district of specially fertile land shaving all the climates and altitudes due to a topography formed bymountain ranges that converge in the Colombian Andean knot (Ma-cizo Colombiano). Highlands and valleys, thermal waters everywhere and powerful telluric and hydrographic resources generators of energycan be found few hours far from Popayán.
All this together with a geographical environment where tropical fruits and fauna proliferate along with a varied richness unexploded mineral reserves like gold, petroleum, copper, antimony, sulfur, bauxite, marble, lime, and coal, timber forests, tourist forests and the Pacific Ocean in the East.
In its 450 years In 1987 a book named "Popayán 450 years" was published to commemorate the anniversary of the foundation of the city. Distinguished citizens collaborated with interesting articles; among the collaborators was Gustavo Wilches Chaux who in that issue gave us to know a map whose original manuscript was in the Maritime Museum of Greenwich. This map is dated in 1650 and includes the signature of the English cartographer Nicholas Comberford. Journalist Wilches Chaux points out that this map was made to inform the navigators on the ports existing at both sides of the Atlantic Ocean, to the North of the equatorial zone. He adds that the map is fruitful in names of islands and littoral cities, but little or anything says about the inland of the continents.
The cartographer Camberford just points out with big red or black letters the names with which the regions located in this part of the world were known. On what today is Colombia, for example, the map deploys a great red sign with the name of the vast territory located to the North of Peru named «POPAIANA»." "Popayán turned 113 years old when Mr. Comberford drew in England his map of ports for merchants’ use, explorers, adventurers and pirates, he baptized «POPAIANA» the New Kingdom of Granada, or whatsome cartographers of Drake simply included under the name of «WestIndias», highlighting only what today are the cities of Riohacha and Cartagena."
"Guide of the historical city", By Architec Germán Téllez Castañeda, (Colombian Culture Institute, 1996)
Cartagena and Mompox are cities of irregular layout, the same as Santa Fe de Bogotá, Tunja or Pamplona, but Popayán, in contrast, is a good example of "classic" geometric layout, according to the traditions of the south and center of Spain, is conformed by a reasonably orthogonal design of streets, more or less guided to the four cardinal points.
This village founded by Sebastian de Belalcázar near the Cauca river appears initially like a distribution of land properties around the main Plaza (current Park of Caldas). This way of distribution carried out by the first Hispanic and Creole residents has been continued in the decades and centuries following the colonial epoch. It is not difficult to suppose that the division in neighborhoods or "cuarteles" (fourthparts of the total population area) was made following the two main axes of the colonial layout: the current 6th avenue, in an approximate direction south-north, and the 5th street, nearly east-west.
The Roman custom of distribution practiced in cities and towns of the colonial province of Iberia, was simply the reflection of the order and military discipline required to establish the legions and civil foundations camps organized in similar areas and zones through crossing two axes, which were at the same time symbolic and real: the decumanum, was located in a central point where a great free space would be left that should be able to lodge all those that conformed the human group of settlers of Spain or, many centuries later, the districts of the New World.
What arrives from the West to the province of New Granada, is Belalcázar’s and his rough soldier’s urban memory which did not imply a sophisticated philosophical notion of ancient methodologies and secrets for urban layouts, but the deep memory of how the towns or cities from which they came from were conformed.
As an urban nucleus, Popayán doesn’t descend in a direct -line from Mileto or another Greek city, but from the Roman colonial military foundations in Hispanic lands, formed by blocks defined by means of an orthogonal web of roads. The original subdivision of those squareblocks in fourths (plots) and even the city itself, allowed the distribution of properties in a strict equivalence for all its possessors The same as many Andalusian, Castilians or Extremenian cities, Popayán slowly, prolonging its geometric layout till where its streets reached thesheers, hills, rivers, and creeks that framed the city.
The place chosen for the foundation of Popayán, besides having abundant water and good surrounding lands, had a smoothly beautifuland evocative landscape, which made the Spaniards remember the places of the mountainous county of central Andalusia or the south of Castile.
The reticule of the streets of Popayán was not a forced imposition on the chosen land, but a soft and tight adjustment to the land and the surrounding landscape, folding the streets to their existent differences and creating slight deviations when it was necessary. The city is another of those discreet and smaller successes of city-planning that populated the Spanish empire in the New World.
At the end of the XVIII century the blocks of the town were not more than fifty and were a continuation of the original grid based onthe Main Plaza, that is to say, an expansion of hardly some forty blocks in something more than two hundred years. The leisurely growth of Popayán favored the formal and environmental harmony that today offers its downtown area.
Rarely the cities that present an express and extensive development have been able to maintain the delicate volumetric balance and the fragile space scale that characterized their beginnings. In the case of Popayán, the original nature of the city wasn’t completely lost because the colonial part of the city was not displaced by the modern city when the colonial one became destroyed by an earthquake.
Popayán was founded in a highly seismic and volcanic risk region; it has been partly and repeatedly destroyed because of the earthquakes.The most intense of these earthquakes were those of 1736 and 1983. In both occasions it was necessary to concentrate resources and efforts, not in the city’s expansion but in the reconstruction of those buildings that were destroyed or damaged.
Until the first half of the XVIII century the urban configuration of the city followed socio-economic parameters strictly determined by the colonial historical process. The farmers and the prosperous merchants of the region built a limited number of "high and low" houses (of one or two floors), and of great built area. These people presumably represented the aristocratic social class, clearly descending of Spaniards – no matter their ancestors were humble peasants or small bourgeois; their houses were differentiated from the humblest residences of artisans, of some workers and those of the more modest merchants. Few neo – Grenadine (Related to Granada in Spain) cities reflected as faithfully as Popayán, their urban configuration and in their architectural ordination, the social hierarchy and the difference of the social classes of their inhabitants.
It should be accepted, with reserves and exceptions, that the appearance of the city and therefore, its urban character as it reachesthe beginnings of the XX century, is due mainly to the city-planningand architectural overlapping. This was carried out during the second half of the XIX century over what was possible to rebuild from the second third of the XVIII century till the end of the colonial period. What distinguishes Popayán among other cities of colonial origin in Colombia is the city-planning and architectural hybridization caused accidentally by seismic movements. These could not erase its urban layout, but they were able to alter its volume and the traditional character of its architecture.
The tendency derived from the above-mentioned was emphasizing the existing urban formal harmony, minimizing differences among facades and balancing their regular appearance. The facades similarity didn’t disappear completely, and the basic principles in the whole co-lonial city were conserved. In Popayán "unanimity is not synonymous of uniformity".
Churches
Catedral Metropolitana Nuestra Señora de la Asunción
Location
5th Street 6-77
Mass celebration schedule:
Monday to Friday: 8:30, 17:00, 18:00
Saturday: 8:30, 12:00, 17:00 and 18:00
Sunday: 7:00, 9:00, 11:00 and 18:00
Description
This was the first Cathedral built of walls of cane plastered with mudand chopped straw. Bishop Juan del Valle consacrated it to Nuestra Señora del Reposo. The 1566 earthquake destroyed it. Reconstruction efforts carried out by Monsignor de la Coruña used mud walls and clay tiles. These works ended in 1609. Earthquakes that occurred in 1736,1751, and 1784, destroyed it again and La Ermita Chapel, San José,and San Francisco Churches replaced it in its duty as Cathedral.
Architect Marcelino Perez de Arroyo began the Cathedral’s reconstruction in 1859 that was directed by Fray Serafín Barbetti and Adolfo Dueñas. This construction ended in 1906 and the building acquired the status of Minor Basilica in 1953. Destroyed once again in1983 by an earthquake, it was restored to its present-day state.
Capilla de la Ermita
Location
5th Street, 2nd Avenue
Mass celebration schedule:
Monday to Friday: 17:00
Saturday: 17:00
Sunday: 9:30 and 17:00
Description:
La Ermita Chapel was built in the firsts days of Popayán’s foundation and thus became the first church this city had. After the earthquakes of 1566, 1736, 1751, and 1784, it was assigned to replace the Cathedral in its duties. Only the earthquake that occurred in 1983 badly damaged La Ermita. After its restoration it continued being one of the most important and traditional churches of the city.
Santo Domingo
4th Street 4-15
Mass celebration schedule:
Monday to Friday: 7:00, 17:00
Saturday: 7:00, 17:00
Sunday: 10:00, 12:00, 17:00, 18:00
Description:
This house of prayer was built at the end of the sixteenth century to worship Nuestra Señora del Rosario. Santo Domingo suffered extensive damage during the earthquake that occurred in 1736. Master Gregorio Cuasi was in charge of the rebuilding process and his work was completed in 1741. Priest Marcelino Perez de Arroyo and the wood worker Camilo Guevara developed the larger wood-carved figures. The sage Caldas designed the pulpit. The 1885 earthquake brought down the temple tower, which was rebuilt by Alfonso Dueñas. After thelast earthquake suffered by the city (1983) it had to be restored again andArchitect Rodrigo Llanos was in charge of this work.
San Francisco
Location:
Corner of 4th Street and 9th Avenue
Mass celebration schedule:
Monday to Friday: 17:00, 18:00
Saturday: 12:00, 17:00, 18:00
Sunday: 10:00
Description:
San Francisco is a very attractive church due to its architecture. It contains several artistic paintings, gold work elements and furniture and the Quiteña School Pulpit created in the 18th Century. During the 1983 earthquake it was seriously affected and years later it was restored with the help of the government of Spain and Colcultura, which is a Colombian cultural institute.
The grand bell of San Francisco was called San Antonio’s bell byDon Antonio Garcia who devoted it to this saint.
In the year 1916, the bronze statue of the illustrious citizen Camilo Torres engraved by the French sculptor Verlet was placed in SanFrancisco’s plaza, and at its base a wonderful prayer was craved byMaster Guillermo Valencia.
San Agustín
Location
6th Avenue 7-54
Mass celebration schedule:
Monday to Friday: 7:00 and 18:00
Saturday: 7:00 and 18:00
Sunday: 7:00, 11:00, 17:00 and 18:00
Description:
San Agustín was constructed towards the end of the 16th century. The church was damaged in the 1736 earthquake and after its reconstruction, its facade was destroyed by another earthquake in1827. New reconstruction works were carried out in 1858. The new tower dates from 1957. There are important works of art in this place of worship. Among them are a crucifix dating back to the 16th century, an image of La Virgen Dolorosa and a bicephalous eagle tabernacle created in 1673 that is 99 cm high and weighs 17 pounds.
Santuario de Belén
Location
This sanctuary was built on the top of a hill in the southeast of thecity.
Mass celebration schedule:
Monday to Friday: 17:00
Saturday: 17:00
Sunday: 11:30, 17:00
Description
The Sanctuary was first a ranch made of walls of chopped straw plastered with mud. During each of the earthquakes that struck this city it was knocked down. Modern materials replaced the old ones around fifty years ago, changing the sanctuary’s architecture and appearance considerably and also enhancing its ability to resist seismic activity. An image of ‘Ecce Homo’donated by Juan Antonio de Velasco in 1717 was placed in this church. This image was brought unfinished from the city of Pasto. Some years later the Spanish sculptor Arturo Lamiel made a replica of the image and it is this replica that now a days is taken down the hill on Palm Sunday by agroup of men for leading the Holy Week traditional processions in Popayán. On May 1st the image is returned to the Sanctuary by a group of women.
In the atrium of the Chapel, on its left side, there is a cross that was built by Migel Aguillón using carved rocks reinforced by an iron bar. It was set and inaugurated on Holy Thursday in 1789. In the base of
this cross there are four religious legends chiseled into the stone that entail prayers against adversity.
San José de la Compañía
Location:
Corner of 5th Street, 8th Avenue
Mass celebration schedule:
Monday to Friday: 17:00
Description
San José was rebuilt several times due to all the earthquakes that struck this city. In 1669 it started out as a simple chapel but later, between 1702 and 1769, it was transformed into a church with the financial backing provided by the Marquise de San Miguel. It became part of the Jesuits’ Seminary till they were expelled from the country. After the 1885 earthquake, Don Adolfo Dueñas rebuilt it again. San José retains its original masonry work, very beautiful religious paintingsand handcraft works.
El Carmen
Location
Corner of 4th Street, 3rd Avenue
Description
In 1774 the Marquise de San Miguel de la Vega financed the construction of this church and Master Gregorio Cuasi built it. Its design includes only one aisle with a main altar in the Mudejar style; Popayán artisans carved the pulpit and the beautiful altarpiece. Almost all the temple has a baroque style wood carvings covered with gold sheaths. It suffered some damage during the 1983 earthquake but, in general, this large church’s inner structure is in good condition.
Templo de la Encarnación
Location
The church is located on the corner of 5th Street and 5th Avenue.
Description
This church houses paintings and carvings that together constitute one of the most beautiful treasures of its kind anywhere. It has baroque altar pieces covered in gold leaf that sheath the altar, the sacrarium and the crown arch in the center of the church. This house of prayer is used as an auditorium for the Religious Music Festival that takesplace during Holy Week.
Museums (Museos)
Museo Mosquera (Mosquera Museum)
This historic and colonial art museum is located in a house built between 1780 and 1788 by José María Mosquera y Figueroa and is a classic example of domestic colonial architecture in Popayán.
Location:
3rd Street 5 – 14
Telephone: 57-2- 8240683
Schedule:
Tuesday to Saturday:
9:00 –12:00 and 14:00 – 17:30
Ticket prize depends on the presentation.
Subject:
Historically speaking, the museum is mainly devoted to the great General Tomás Cipriano de Mosquera (1798 – 1878), to the era he lived in and to the local and national figures that were involved in hispolitical and military activities during the emancipation process of the Spanish American colonies (1810 – 1819). These figures participated in the creation and consolidation of these republics and General Mosquera played a decisive role as a soldier, statesman, gographer and historian.
Description:
The first owner of this colonial building was José María Mosquera y Figueroa. Tomás Cipriano de Mosquera later inherited the house. It was built in the 18th century and the house is now divided into three parts. One of the divisions houses a museum and the other the Historical Archives, both belonging to the University of Cauca. The third section is now a hotel.
The house has two large patios surrounded by corridors that connect to a large number of rooms used to exhibit historic and artistic paintings, icons and other items that formed part of the life of the owners’ era.
One of the sections of the museum is dedicated to colonial art. Valuable artistic pieces of this period exhibited there belong to the Quito School (Arte Quiteño) to which almost all the artistic elements that enrich this city belong. The connection between Popayán and Quito was established due to great economic prosperity arising from mineral, agricultural and livestock exploitation in this vast territory.
Since its founding, Popayán has been intimately linked with what is now the capital of Ecuador whose excellent and numerous artists were great providers of paintings, sculptures, gold and silver workand, in particular: figures carved in wood.
During the months of October and November, the museum holds anannual Ibero– American seminar on colonial art of all the Ibero-American countries allowing the diffusion and motivating the study ofthis valuable cultural heritage in all its forms.
Temporary exhibitions offered by the museum show different topics and material such as history, typical customs of the region, photography, paintings, regional flora, the history of the University of Cauca and more.
Museo de Historia Natural (Natural History Museum)
All the natural richness of the Department of Cauca and many other places in Colombia can be appreciated here. The different thematicrooms show the evolution of the species found around the world. Both, parents and children, can enjoy and learn in this enticing museum.
Location:
2nd Street No. 1 A - 25
Telephone: 57 – 2 – 8234115
Fax: 57 – 2 – 8235516
Opening Hours:
8:00 – 12:00 and 14:00 – 17:00
Ticket: $2.000 Pesos
Services: Specialized guide.
Subject:
Elements of two of Nature’s kingdoms: mineral and animal. There isa herbarium for research activities as well.
Description:
The Natural History Museum of the University of Cauca began to function in 1936 as a research and community support centerunder the guidance of Professor Carlos Lehmann. Later, the museum was directed by Professor Juan Giacometto who enlarged the collections the museum had with samples of sea fauna of the Colombian Caribbean Coast. In 1946 the University commissioned the notable Sweden taxidermist Kjell von Sneidern as director of the Museum. He carried out numerous scientific research expeditions throughout the county and brought numerous materials for thezoological collections.
This museum was first located on the University Campus, in front ofthe School of Education. After the 1983 earthquake, the University of Cauca housed it in a three-story building that is today known as the (Vicerrectoría de Investigaciones) Research Directorate.
From 1983 to 1998 Professor Alvaro José Negret Fernandez was director of the museum. He contributed important ornithological and entomological collections and founded the geology room.
The museum sections are organized in a sequential order indicating the evolution process of the different species. There are sections for Geology, Paleontology, Oceanography, Herpetology, Entomology andOrnithology.
Museo Arquidiosesano de Arte Religioso. (Archdiocese Museumof Religious Art)
Visitors can observe that the Archdiocesan Museum houses ancientreligious art works in its exhibition rooms. These date from the XVI,XVII, and the XVIII centuries.
Location
4th Street No. 4 – 56
Telephone: 57 – 2 8242759
Opening Hours:
Monday to Friday:
8:30 - 12:30 and 14:30 – 18:00
Saturday:
10:00 – 13:00
Ticket: $2.000 Pesos
Security vault: $3.000 Pesos
Services: specialized guide.
Publications, catalogs, photographs and postcards can be acquired here.
Collections:
This museum exhibits different easel paintings, sculptures, gold works, embroidery works and other church elements on a rotation basis. The works have been made by Ecuatorian artists as well as artists from the old colonial province of Popayán. These artistic elements indicate the piety and the esthetic expression of the age.
Description:
The Archdiocese Museum of Religious Art was created and regulated by Bishop’s Decrees. The first, 386, was issued in October 1972; 026 coming on July 12, 1977. The objective stated was to protect, conserve, restore and exhibit the numerous religious artworks owned by the archdiocese, parishes, churches, and chapels and, if possible,those owned by private individuals.
The museum acquired its mandate by national support given in 1974 for an old house built in the XVIII century in a neoclassic style, thatused a design made by Don Marcelino Perez de Arroyo.
This househad belonged to the Arboleda family before ownership was transferred. From 1976 to 1979 it was restored and adapted for the use it has today. On September 21, 1991 it was opened with a valuable collectionof artworks from different religious entities in the city and in the province of Cauca. The museum continued its exhibitions until March 31, 1983 when an earthquake damaged it.
The artworks were rescued and put under the custody of the Banco de la República. With the support of this bank, many restorers were hired and personnel of Santa Clara Restoring Center in Bogotá helped in the restoration work. Thanks to this restoration work, local, national and international visitors can admire, as never before, the extraordinary beauty of the items exhibited in this museum which is one of the most important of its type in the country.
Nowadays, the museum exhibits art works from the XVI, XVII and XVIII centuries housed in nine beautiful rooms. It holds paintings and other elements from the Escuela Quiteña and Payanesa as well as other art works demonstrating influence from European artists such as those from Italy and Spain.
The rooms are distributed in the following order: the first one contains a Religious Art Introduction, the second room hosts the Arte Quiteño, then comes the Legarda room, followed the Caspicara one, the next room is called La Capilla (the Chapel), the sixth room’s name is the Sala de la Última Cena (The Last Supper), the seventh is the Sala Cortéz, the eighth is the Influencias del Arte (Art Influences) and the Sala de la Pasión (the Passion room), the last exhibition room contains gold and silver artworks and ornaments including the most beautiful tabernacles, sacrariums and pyxes.
Museo Casa Valencia. (Valencia’s House Museum)
All the works and life of the eminent poet Guillermo León Valenciaand his relatives are collected here.
Location:
6th Avenue, No. 2 – 36
Telephone: 57-2-8242081
Opening Hours:
Tuesday to Sunday: 9:00 – 12:00 and 15:00 – 18:00
Ticket: Adults $2.000 Pesos
Services: Specialized guide.
Collection:
This house was built at the end of the XVIII Century and its owner was Don José Gregorio Angulo. Later Don Ignacio Muñoz bought the house and donated it to his daughter Josefina, who became poet Guillermo Valencia’s wife. The Valencia family lived in this house until their last days. Later the government bought the house and turned it into a museum. There is mausoleum containing the mortal remains of the poet, his wife, and those of Josefina and Guillermo León, the latter of whom was President of Colombia.
Museo Efrain Martínez: El Refugio (Efrain Martinez Museum:The Refuge)
As the name says, this house was the place of refuge where this artist found the inspiration he needed to create his beautiful artworks. Here too one can find some works and accounts of his life which hisfamily keeps to this very day.
Location:
3rd Avenue, Exit South-East, road to Calicanto, los Tejares
Telephone: 57-2-8223364
Opening Hours:
All days from 9:30 –12:00 and 14:00 – 17:00
Ticket: adults $2.000 Pesos and children $1.000 Pesos
Description:
The house’s construction dates from the XVIII Century and its first owner was Francisco de Belalcazar. Many people bought and sold the house until it came into the possession of the artist Efraím Martinez. He was quite a celebrity due to his paintings. Through his works of art he was recognized and given awards both at the national and international levels. One of his best known works is the picture named"Apoteosis de Popayán" (Apotheosis of Popayán) that was inspired by a poem named "Canto a Popayán" written by the poet Guillermo Valencia. This enormous, breath takingly panoramic painting covers the front wall of the Paraninfo (Assembly Hall) Francisco José de Caldas in the University of Cauca.
Casa Museo Negret y de Arte Moderno (Negret’s House andModern Art Museum)
This is one of the most important modern art museums in the country. Many important works of the sculptor and painter Edgar Negret and some creations of other artists are exhibited in this museum.
Location:
5th Street No. 10 – 23
Telephone: 57-2-8244546
Opening Hours:
Tuesday to Saturday:
8:30 – 12:00 and 14:00 – 17:30
Services: Specialized guide, store books about Negret
Collection:
This museum exhibits many works of the modern sculptor and painter Edgar Negret. He was born in 1920 and spent his infancy and youth in this house. The museum also houses other modern artists’ works who have contributed sculptures, paintings and abstract works. Negret’s works are well-known in Colombia and several countriesof Latin-America.
Description:
The house was built in the XVIII Century and was bought by the Negret family in 1930. In 1938, the artist Edgar Negret traveled to Cali to develop his academic and artistic skills in the Bellas Artes School. Six years later he came back to Popayán to work on sculpture, because painting was not his forte. For a while he traveled to New York and Europe where he learnt and deepened his knowledge on sculpture and achieved international fame with his important sculptures.
In 1981 the Fundación de Arte Contemporáneo (Contemporary Art Foundation) in Popayán was successful in obtaining from the ConsejoMunicipal (Municipality Council) a statement declaring the house public property. During the 1983 earthquake the building was destroyed. The Consejo bought it and began its rebuilding, trying to conserve the original architecture and adapting it for the needs of a museum.
Casa Caldas (Caldas’ House)
The wise man Francisco José Caldas lived in this house during his youth. This time-worn house was built during the XVIII century andwas rebuilt and enlarged in the typical style of that era to lodge all themembers of his extensive family.
Location:
3rd Street No. 4 – 70
Telephone: 57-2-8205250
Opening Hours:
Monday to Friday:
8:00 – 12:00 and 14:00 – 18:00
Collection:
The house belonged to the estate of the Caldas Tenorio family. Thewise man Francisco José de Caldas was born here. He was thefifth of fifteen brothers and sisters.
Description:
This house testifies to the wise man Francisco José Caldas’ life as a youth. Built during the XVIII century, it was rebuilt and enlarged by Caldas in 1792 preserving the typical style of the age that called for only one floor to lodge all the members of his large family. Nowadays this house is part of the University of Cauca and houses the Vicerrectoría de Cultura y Bienestar (Culture and Well-being Directorate) and has a special area with a gambling room, a small library and a section for permanent exhibition on the wise man Caldas’ history and work.
Caldas’ Biography
Caldas studied Jurisprudence, Philosophy and, in particular, Astronomy. He was a colleague of the wise man José Celestino Mutis with whom he cooperated in a Botanical Expedition. Caldas was named director of the Observatorio Astronómico de Santafé and wrote numerous letters in which he recounted each one of the experiences he had during the research he carried out in the field. He directed the Quarterly Diario Político (Political Diary) but his main activities involved his scientific work.
In 1810 when the fight for independence began, he had to join to the army and participate in several battles against his will. He did not want to die because he wanted to contine his scientific studies. When he saw his Popayán companions’ defeat, he decided to take refuge in his parents’ farm in Paispamba located in the Western mountains of Popayán until he would be able to leave. However, he was found, taken to prison and shot together with Francisco Antonio de Ulloa and Miguel Buch in October 1816. Their remains are kept in thePanteón de los Próceres in Popayán.
Paraninfo Francisco José de Caldas (Francisco José de Caldas Assembly Hall)
Beautiful eclectic precinct decorated with the picture called "Apoteosis a Popayán" painted by the artist Efraím Martinez.
Teatro Municipal Guillermo Valencia (Municipal Theater GuillermoValencia)
Building constructed in an eclectic style opened in 1927 and destroyedby an earthquake in 1983. It was reopened in 2000.
Other touristic attractions
Procesiones Chiquitas (Children’s Procession)
During Holy Week, five processions take place in Popayán, one each day from Tuesday to Saturday. They have become the most important tradition in this city. These processions include the porters of platforms much like those that can be seen in Seville Spain. The platforms depictall of Jesus’ Passion and Death.
During Easter Week, children assume the role of the adult characters in the Holy Week as if they were playing. Porters, moqueros (persons, in this case children, who are in charge of cleaning and lighting thecandles of each portable platform, upon which each event of Jesus’passion is represented); Sahumadoras (girls who carry incense and flowers) and even children dressed as priests. Furthermore, there are two bands, one of which is military, and the children’s choir of the University of Cauca sings there as well. All of these characters escort the procession giving it a solemn tenor. All the children’s characters and the icons on these platforms representing Jesus’ Way of the Crossappear during these processions.
After several previous attempts, in 1949 Pedro Antonio Paz initiated this children’s game as an accurate imitation of the adults’ Holy Week processions. This custom of the children’s Procession continues to this day. Its icons are genuine works of art, wood carved images, which are beautifully dressed and decorated.
Pedrito Paz’s processions ensure the local traditions will be preserved and are an important part of life in Popayán. This is not only because parents are involved in the work of preparing and embedding these customs in their children but also because they are a very pleasant tourist attraction. The children’s processions take place during Easter Week.
Parque de Caldas (Caldas Park or Central Park)
Caldas Park is the main park of the city and is located in the heart ofthe colonial area.
Description:
As was the case with all founding of Spanish conquered cities, the main park was always the heart of early towns. The above-mentioned park was created in 1537 and in the city’s early years, this park was the marketplace. Later, in 1538, in its center, a pillory stock was located where two citizens, Jorge Robledo and Alvaro Oyon were decapitated. This pillory stock remained there until 1766 and was replaced successively during spring in 1805, a stone water fountain, and finally abust of the wise man Caldas (1910) made by the French sculptor Verlet.
The trees we can see today were planted during the same period. Later, a steel-bar and lanterns frame created by Julio Ramos enclosed the park. These lanterns were replaced by electric lamps for illuminating Popayán nights. Some time later the steel bars were removed.
El Morro de Tulcán (Tulcan Hill)
Location:
Second Avenue, First Street.
Description:
In the year 1929 when the road to the old aqueduct was built, a mound of bricks or great adobe blocks was discovered that, as time went by, had acquired the color tonality of the surrounding ground. People thought that the hill was artificial and some saw it as an unfinished pyramid built by a pre-Hispanic native culture for ritual purposes. This idea lasted until the 1983 earthquake when ground slippage provided some additional clues.
Excavations made by archeologist Julio César Cubillos in 1958 showed that the hill’s shape was natural and that the local Indians had used it asa sacred place to worship the sun and as a cemetery. During excavations, sixty tombs were explored and human bones, amorphous ceramics, grindstones, and many other pre-Hispanic artifacts were found. Apparently, the hill was given its uniform shape by Indians bringing, on their backs, ground and grass from other nearby places to fill in unevensections of the land. On the hill’s top work was carried out so that astone structure for supporting Belalcazar’s statue could be built.
Restaurants (Restaurantes)
Rancho Grande
For the best tasting foods. The authentic ‘Viejoteka’ on Fridays treats you to golden oldies from the 60s and 70s. Credit cards accepted:Diners, Credibanco Visa
Location: North Highway 32 N 50
Open:
Mondays to Thursdays: 11:30 A.M. – 11:00 P.M.
Fridays: 11:30 A.M. – 4:00 A.M.
Saturdays and Sundays: 11:30 A.M. –12:00 A.M.
Telephone: +57 – 2 8235788 – +57 – 2 8205219
Services:
Restaurant/Bar: wide selection of national and international dishes.
Space available for meetings, banquets, conferences, businessmeetings, coming-of-age party, fist communion and birthdays.
Fridays from 9 P.M. on ‘Viejoteca’ at no additional cost.
Camino Viejo
Serves typical dishes, especially empanadas, tamales and champus (delicious fruit drink)
Sundays and holidays: sancocho de gallina (very traditional chickensoup loved throughout the country)
Location: 9th Avenue 57 N 82
Telefono: + 57-2-8234962
Lonchería Caldas
The tasty corner of Popayán
Serves some of the best chicken sandwiches in the city.
Location: 6th Avenue 8 – 04
Subsidiary: 17th Avenue 6-25
Schedule: Open every day
Telephone: +57 – 2 8240448 +57 – 2 8215068
Parador Turístico Torre Molinos
Services:
Restaurant, Conference room, banquets, Video pub
Great grills.
Location: North highway 33 N 100
Telephone: +57 – 2 823 4104
