Capilla de Calle Agua

The Faro de la Victoria Chapel, the Chapel on the corner of Agua Street or the Rescate Chapel are some of the names by which this historic monument of the city of Malaga is known.

The Rescate Chapel has a centralised floor plan with an irregular hexagonal shape and an elliptical interior. The building consists of three sections, the first and main one, with an order of Tuscan columns on a stone pedestal and an arch on each of the three façades that support a double entablature. The façade, which is chamfered, has three arches leading to the chapel, the two lateral ones being blinded off. They are semicircular with the thread and the jambs cut out. A frieze and cornice with mouldings run above the columns. The second section has ovals and rectangles in recesses and, in the corners as a decorative element, simple vases that are placed in front of small niches. It is topped with a conical glazed-tile roof and a simple hexagonal lantern with ceramic decorations. Inside, there are niches on the three central sides facing the entrance and smooth walls, with Corinthian pilasters and attached columns with grooved shafts above them. On the plinth there is a large niche that houses the titular images of the Hermandad del Rescate (Brotherhood of the Rescue).

The ceiling is formed by a ribbed plaster vault that starts from the cornice, which is supported by the pilasters attached to the wall.

The chapel has undergone several restorations, the first of which was carried out in 1897, the extent of its intervention being unknown, and it remained closed until the first half of the 20th century. It was later restored again after the Civil War and in 1949 it became the headquarters of the Brotherhood of Jesús del Rescate and María Santísima de Gracia, moving the images in 1951. After the restoration in 1995, the chapel, which had problems with damp, was reopened and the roofs were mainly restored. In 2003 it underwent an intervention to recover and rectify the damp due to an adjoining plot of land.

It corresponds to the typology of the street chapel, which can be related to the 'musallas' or street oratories of the Hispano-Muslim cities, which later became widespread in Andalusia between the 16th and 18th centuries. Normally located in bivios or squares, they acquire full significance within the concept of the convent-city.

From a formal point of view, most of these chapels were built using Baroque language, treated in a popular style. The fragility of their design made it necessary to look for structural supports in neighbouring buildings, being attached to a church or another type of building, or looking for the chamfer of the block.

This building continues the tradition of the street chapels of the Modern Age, even though it was built in 1800, constituting a good example of typology and of the sacralisation of public space.

Its historical value makes it an exceptional case, as it is the only chapel founded by a brotherhood in the 19th century in Malaga. Different socio-political and economic causes determined that in the first half of the 19th century there was a notable decline in economic activity compared to the previous century, leading to the economic ruin of the brotherhoods, due to different vicissitudes such as the Napoleonic occupation of the city between 1810 and 1812, as well as the alienation of their assets between 1790, 1795 and 1810, which meant not only a decrease in their purchasing power but also the loss of the social and institutional bases that had created and maintained these guilds. Its historical value is also relevant due to its link to both the brotherhood of the Holy Rosary of the Barrio de la Victoria in the 18th century and the current Passionist brotherhood of Nuestro Padre Jesús del Rescate y María Santísima de Gracia.

Due to its artistic value, in terms of its spatial conception and architectural language, it is linked to the Baroque style, a period which saw the fullness of religious manifestations.

The Rescate Chapel has formed part of the urban image of the popular Calle de la Victoria, from its construction to the present day, receiving public worship in one of the few street chapels that have been preserved in Malaga.

Article obtained from Wikipedia article Wikipedia in his version of 05/08/2022, by various authors under the license Licencia de Documentación Libre GNU.