Faculty of Fine Arts of Pontevedra

The Faculty of Fine Arts of Pontevedra is a Spanish art faculty founded in 1990 in Pontevedra. It is housed in the former Maestranza and Saint Ferdinand Barracks, an eclectic late 19th century civil building in the city of Pontevedra, Spain. It is the only Faculty of Fine Arts in Galicia and northwestern Spain
Location.
The building is located at 2, Maestranza Street in Pontevedra.
History.
The Royal House of the Maestranza was built by Iñigo Melchor Fernández de Velasco, Constable of Castile and León and Captain General of Galicia between 1665 and 1668. It was built with stone from the demolition of houses in the A Moureira neighbourhood, which had been left abandoned at the end of the previous century. It was a one-storey building with four wings and a large central courtyard, whose initial function was to house soldiers in transit during the war with Portugal (1640–1668).
The English invasion of 1719 led by General Homobod ruined the building, which at that time was used as a storehouse for old weapons, grenades, bombs, gunpowder and some melted down artillery. After the invasion and capitulation of Pontevedra on 25 Octobrer 1719 small consolidation works were carried out, such as repairing the roofs. The building was so badly damaged that the soldiers had to be accommodated in different barracks in the city.
The municipality of Pontevedra asked the Bourbon monarchy to rebuild the Real Maestranza. The procedures for the reconstruction of the barracks began with the order of the Intendant Francisco Salvador de Pineda, to accommodate a cavalry squadron of the Montesa Regiment in the city. The Minister of War, the Duke of Montemar, ordered the military engineer Antonio Flobert to draw up the plans for the new building (preserved in the General Archive of Simancas in the province of Valladolid).
The "Real Maestranza" began to be rebuilt in the year 1738. The construction designed by Antonio Flobert took advantage of the walls of the previous barracks and the heraldry. The barracks was named Saint Ferdinand and was later renovated and enlarged. It was used as a gun factory during the Spanish War of Independence. From the end of the 18th century, the Princess Infantry Regiment was based in this barracks. In 1807 it was led by the Count of San Román.
At the end of the 19th century, the barracks were in a state of ruin and it was decided to demolish them to construct a new building. The current building, which dates from the end of the 19th century, was completed in 1900 and was designed by the architect Méndez Conde. The building was restructured in 1905 to accommodate a larger garrison. In front of its façade, the Count de la Peña del Moro Field was redesigned, adding trees and gardens and a street at the entrance to the barracks. The transverse street of the Maestranza was also redesigned in 1911, under the name of General Martitegui Street, after the demolition of some houses. In the 20th century, among its military functions, the barracks housed Company No. 83 of the Military police and the Parks and Garages Unit.
The definitive abandonment of the barracks by the military took place on 15 December 1992 in a military protocol ceremony held in the inner courtyard of the building, in the presence of all the local authorities. The property was handed over to the municipality of Pontevedra, which transferred it to the Galician Faculty of Fine Arts. The renovation project was entrusted to the architect César Portela. The remodelling was complex as it transformed a closed barracks into an open and luminous space for artistic education.
Between December 1994 and January 1995, the renovation of the building intended to house the Faculty of Fine Arts was completed. In 1994, the Faculty of Fine Arts of Pontevedra, created in 1990, moved in.
The patron saint of the faculty, St. Ero, was adopted in 1990.
Architecture.
It is a large rectangular building in the eclectic style. It has a ground floor and two upper floors, with rectangular windows, balcony Parapets and Lintels forming auricles, typical of the 19th century in Pontevedra.
The central part of the façade, where the entrance door is located, the base, the balcony parapets and the window and door lintels are made of granite. The façade is crowned at the top by the Spanish coat of arms, also in granite.
During the exterior renovation of the facade in 1994, the plaster of the walls where the masonry was visible was recovered and the colour guava was applied to it.
Inside the building, the large central courtyard is remarkable. After the 1995 and 2006 remodelling, it was given a perimeter body for circulation in the form of a glass gallery, and a cubic room, also made of glass, was introduced into the interior, containing the large, flexible studios for sculpture, drawing and painting. A new floor was also created under the roof of the existing building to house the library, a documentation and information centre and other workshops, all with overhead lighting.
The Faculty.
Studies.
The faculty awards the University Degree in Fine Arts. The centre also hosts the Master's degree in Fashion Design and Creative Direction and the PhD in Creation and Research in Contemporary Art.
Facilities.
The faculty has an exhibition room, "the X Room", located at the entrance of the building.
The faculty's library has 55 periodical titles and over 10,000 volumes and has 108 reading places.
The faculty also has multi-purpose workshops, equipped with hand tools and specific machines (workshops for metal, wood, ceramics, plastic and other materials).
There is also an audiovisual laboratory, other laboratories for graphic techniques (intaglio) and photography and a computer room (for digital and 3D image processing and digital photographic processing).
Deans.
So far the deans of the faculty have been: 