Iglesias, College Church

The church is located prospectively on the axis that leads from Porta Nuova to the square. It can be considered as the only building unit that delimits two morphologically differentiated areas of the historic center: the first, in front of the building, is characterized by commercial activities and services inserted in the urban context; the second is the “Sa Costera” district, the oldest nucleus of the medieval city. The latter, in addition to its residential destination, also stands out for its orography: in fact, it is located on the slope at the base of Colle Buon Cammino.
The building stands on the ruins of the ancient Palazzo dei Donoratico, in a particularly humid area, which caused the damage that the architect Renato Sanna repaired when he prepared the restoration of the church in 1982. In the former college, which later became an episcopal seminary in 1774 and later used as a public school, the restoration of the ancient architectural unit is currently underway, aimed at the construction of a diocesan museum.
The church is dedicated to the Immaculate Conception, although known as the “College Church”, in memory of its belonging to the Jesuits. The Order arrived in Iglesias at the invitation of the citizens who taxed themselves to offer an annual income of 600 liras, promising a house with an attached church. In 1579, the Jesuit architect Giovanni Maria Bernardoni described to Father Mercuriano, general of the Order, the result of his inspection of the city: “The place where you have to go to school is the most beautiful in the whole city, where there is a beautiful garden: the site of that place is mediocrely large, so you can make the church very capable and home for 30 very comfortably”.
Three projects, published by Renata Serra, are known to fully comply with the ideals of sobriety and synthesis of the Society of Jesus. In the two drawings preserved in the National Library of Paris, there is a first proposal for a building with a cross plan, a dome at the intersection of the transept and a single room with two chapels on each side. The other from the Archivum Romanorum Societatis Jesu, dated 1693 and corresponding to the current floor plan, reworks the layout of the Gothic-Catalan buildings in a Renaissance key: a large nave with three chapels on each side, which, with their height, contribute to giving unity and impetus to the entire structure. Symbol of the Trinity, the chapels from a structural point of view are in harmony with the presbytery. The roof is a barrel vault introduced from a round arch adorned with lacunars and, in both cases, steps fill the difference in height with the room that appears lower.
The building had to meet two functional needs: that of the faithful, resolved in the spatial unity of the aisle, and that of the clergy who needed rapid communication between the building and the adjoining college. This was the function of the choir and the matroneo. The predominant feature of this unique example of counter-reform architecture is the perfect correspondence between interior and exterior: the refined and luminous balance of the classroom can be seen right from the façade. Extremely simple, it is played on the contrast between the white plaster and the red of the vulcanite with which the pilasters and the frames that frame the wooden portal are made. The bichromia continues in the broken tympanum that echoes the curved line of the end of the roof, with its peculiar “carabiniere's hat” shape. In the center of the tympanum, aligned with the window, the coat of arms of the Society of Jesus dominates.

History of studies

Formerly studied by Renata Serra, the church is the subject of a summary fact sheet in the volume by Francesca Segni Pulvirenti and Aldo Sari on late-Gothic and Renaissance-influenced architecture (1994).

Bibliography
R. Serra, “The Jesuit 'fashion' and the architecture of the Society of Jesus in Sardinia”, in Art and Culture of the 17th and 18th centuries in Sardinia. Proceedings of the National Conference, Naples, 1984;
A. Ingegno, Iglesias a century of protection of the archite ttonic heritage, Oristano, S'Alvure, 1987;
F. Segni Pulvirenti - A. Sari, Late Gothic architecture with Renaissance influence. Nuoro, Ilisso, 1994, sheet 54;
Diocese of Iglesias, edited by G. Murtas, series “Churches and Sacred Art in Sardinia”, Cagliari, Zonza, 2001.