Spain Guide
Madrid
La Ermita de San Antonio de la Florida
Address: Glorieta de la Florida 5
Opening time: Tues– Fri 9.30am–2pm & 4–8pm, Sat & Sun 10am–2pm, July 13–23 closed afternoons
Price: Free
Website: www.munimadrid.es/ermita
The little church of La Ermita de San Antonio de la Florida was built on a Greek-cross plan by an Italian, Felipe Fontana, between 1792 and 1798, and decorated by Goya, whose frescoes are the reason to visit. If you can, go on Saturdays, when there are guided tours in English. The dome holds a depiction of a miracle performed by St Anthony of Padua. Around it, heavenly bodies of angels and cherubs hold back curtains to reveal the main scene: the saint resurrecting a dead man to give evidence in favour of a prisoner (the saint's father) falsely accused of murder.
Beyond this central group, Goya created a gallery of highly realist characters – their models were court and society figures – while for a lesser fresco of the angels adoring the Trinity in the apse, he took prostitutes as his models. The ermita also houses the artist's mausoleum, although his head was stolen by phrenologists for examination in the nineteenth century.