Renaissance Art Route

One of the richest and most original cultural routes in the entire province of Ciudad Real. Ideal for lovers of art, history, and heritage, it runs through the heart of the Campo de Montiel region, linking five municipalities that preserve exceptional examples of the Spanish Renaissance: Gothic-Renaissance transitional churches, Plateresque portals, the most complete and best-preserved Mannerist altarpiece in the province, stately homes with arcaded courtyards, and the legacy of Fernando Yáñez de Almedina, considered by Tormo to be the most exquisite Renaissance painter in Spain and a direct disciple of Leonardo da Vinci.

Stop 1. Church of Saint Andrew the Apostle and Casa Grande – Villamanrique
Starting point of the route. The Parish Church of San Andrés Apóstol in Villamanrique, declared a Site of Cultural Interest, is one of the finest examples of transitional Gothic-Renaissance architecture in the Campo de Montiel region. Built by the Order of Santiago in the 16th century, it features a single nave with side chapels and a splendid Renaissance portico decorated with grotesques of human figures, animals, birds, and angels, sculptures of the Virgin and the Angel of the Annunciation, and a Calvary scene in a central niche. Its square tower, with 107 steps, dominates the La Mancha landscape. Just a few meters away, the Casa Grande or Casa de la Encomienda, popularly known as the Casa de los Manrique, is the most outstanding example of Renaissance civil architecture in the municipality: a porticoed building with a quadrangular courtyard and galleries of wooden balusters and upright posts reminiscent of the palaces of the Golden Age. Its façade displays the coat of arms of the Montoya family. Both monuments are declared Cultural Heritage Sites.

Stop 2. Church of Our Lady of the Elms and Altarpiece by Francisco Cano – Tower of Juan Abad
The great jewel of the Renaissance-Mannerist altarpieces of the Campo de Montiel region. The Church of Our Lady of the Elms, declared a Site of Cultural Interest, is a 16th-century Renaissance church with a single nave and vaulted transept, laid out in a Latin cross plan. Its presbytery houses the main altarpiece, commissioned from the sculptor and architect Francisco Cano—a resident of Villanueva de los Infantes and a key figure of Mannerism in La Mancha—in 1581 and completed in 1607 by his successors. Made of polychrome and gilded wood, it measures eight meters wide and thirteen meters high and is the most complete and best-preserved of all those that adorned the churches of the Campo de Montiel. Restored in 2021, it shines once again in all its splendor. The temple also preserves two Baroque altarpieces by Cristóbal García Hidalgo (1759-1762), mural paintings on pilasters and pendentives of the crossing and the famous historical organ of 1763 by Gaspar de la Redonda Zeballos.

Stop 3. Church of Saint Vincent Martyr – Cózar
The Church of San Vicente Mártir in Cózar, declared a Historic-Artistic Monument in 1983, is one of the most outstanding Renaissance churches in the province. Built between the late 15th and early 16th centuries, its elongated rectangular floor plan is constructed of reddish sandstone ashlar with robust exterior buttresses topped with pinnacles. The interior, with a single nave featuring engaged half-columns and an entablature with chiaroscuro moldings, is covered with simple ribbed vaults. The most distinctive element is its main portal, a two-tiered Renaissance altarpiece-portal from the 17th century with incipient Baroque elements, containing various scenes of the Calvary and the symbols of the Order of Santiago. This doorway opens onto the cobbled Lonja, one of the most authentic urban spaces in the region.

Stop 4. Yáñez de Almedina Open Air Museum and Church of Santa María – Almedina
The town that gave the Spanish Renaissance its most universal painter. Fernando Yáñez de Almedina was born in this small town in La Mancha at the end of the 15th century. A direct disciple of Leonardo da Vinci in Florence and collaborator on the cartoon for the Battle of Anghiari, he introduced the Leonardo-esque style to Spain, characterized by sfumato, soft faces, and formal clarity that his contemporaries recognized as unique. His most outstanding works can be admired today in the Prado Museum (Saint Catherine of Alexandria, considered his masterpiece, Saint Damian and Saint Anne with the Virgin and Child) and in the cathedrals of Valencia and Cuenca. In 1518, he returned to Almedina to paint the main altarpiece for its parish church, now lost, although the surviving panel arrived at the Prado in 1941. A stroll through Almedina today is like walking through an open-air Renaissance gallery: the Open-Air Museum, with 26 ceramic reproductions of his works, decorates the town's facades. Next to it, the 14th-century Parish Church of Santa María, with its beautiful tower and Gothic details, and the Emperor's Fountain, with its three spouts and the imperial coat of arms of Charles V, are well worth a visit.

Stop 5. Renaissance Monumental Complex – Villanueva de los Infantes
The grand finale: the capital of the La Mancha Renaissance. Villanueva de los Infantes, declared a Historic-Artistic Site in 1974, is the municipality that best concentrates the Renaissance and Mannerist legacy of the Campo de Montiel region. Its Church of San Andrés Apóstol, the centerpiece of the Plaza Mayor, features three portals of exceptional interest: two Plateresque portals attributed to Francisco Luna—father-in-law of the architect Andrés de Vandelvira—and the main Classical portal, created between 1611 and 1614 by Francisco Cano under the direct influence of Herrera's El Escorial and Serlio's treatise. Inside, the 16th-century Plateresque marble pulpit is one of the jewels of La Mancha Mannerism, covered on all four sides with reliefs of amphorae, a phoenix, and sphinxes. The urban environment completes the experience: the 16th-century Renaissance Alhóndiga, the Hospital de Santiago (1631), the Revuelta Palace with its courtyard of pseudo-Ionic columns and more than 160 heraldic shields on stone portals and facades form the most important Renaissance and Baroque civil complex in the province of Ciudad Real.