by Infoguide Penny Williams

One day Michaela and I don our motorcycle gear again, and make a day trip from her base in Ayaviri to the town of Orurillo. It’s 48 km down the road, an easy hop for Michaela’s 1200-cc BMW, and home to a late-16th c. adobe church, the Templo de Santa Ana.

(Note: In December I spent two weeks with former P&D volunteer Michaela Novotna in Ayaviri, high in the Peruvian altiplano in Puno Region, visiting the colonial-era art restoration project with which she is now involved. For background, see my first post, published here 13 January.)

Orurillo is framed by mountains and spiralled around a central plaza anchored on one side by the church and on another by the municipal offices.

But we’re not here for exuberant secular architecture, we’re here for the church. Santa Ana is one of the earlier examples of colonial-era churches still standing, it is still entirely original (except for the roof) — and, typical of these early churches in Puno Region, it is crumbling.

In fact, it has been condemned by the secular authorities as unsafe for use. They use it anyway.

Michaela points out the abandoned side door, and ravages to the adobe. We circle back to the main door, open for today’s Mass. It is a double celebration, not only of the Feast of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary, but also First Communion for a large group of school children.

I know the interior will be lavishly decorated, a rich example of Andean Baroque. Even so, I am stunned.

Layer on layer. the beauty climbs the walls — and, as you can see behind the altar, it is strategically held in place with scaffolding and supporting poles.

We settle into a pew, tuck our motorcycle helmets at our feet. I look around, first at the paintings that line the opposite wall …

then at the ornate, gilded pulpit on our side of the church. I’m also charmed by the little girls in front of me, wide-eyed as they too look around.

Equally appealing, the little boy fingering the nosegay — there is one at every pew end, in honour of the day’s celebrations. He pulls out strands; his mother gently rescues the strands and tucks them back in place.

Everywhere you look, great beauty and great fragility. Poles prop up paintings …

long cracks split interior walls.

After the service, everyone pours through the massive door into the welcome warmth of mid-day sun. The new Communicants cluster with family and friends, chattering with excitement, posing for endless photos.

“If we are ever able to extend our work beyond the cathedral in Ayaviri to other churches in Puno Region,” says Michaela, “this church will be first on our list.”

Want to know more?

• Contact Michaela, at [email protected]
• Read the more extensive posts on my own blog, at https://icelandpenny.wordpress.com (then scroll back to 4 December for the first entry)