Calle de Alonso Cano

Behind the sign stands Alonso Cano, born in Granada in 1601 and dead there in 1667, one of those artists who mastered three trades at once: he painted, sculpted, and drew up architecture with equal ease. Critics regard him as the founder of the Granada school and one of the major figures of the Spanish Baroque. He served Philip IV in Madrid from 1638 and taught drawing to Prince Baltasar Carlos. His life holds a dark episode: in 1644 his wife was found murdered at home, he was arrested as a suspect of instigating the crime and put to torture. He was acquitted and later returned to Granada as a prebendary of the cathedral, where he left his Marian cycle in the main chapel. The calle de Alonso Cano runs through the Ríos Rosas neighborhood, in Chamberí. Midway along it beats the Chamberí market, with its fruit and fish stalls, and beneath the asphalt the metro station that has borne the same name since 1998.