PERIOD 15th - 19th century

DESCRIPTION

Built at the end of the 15th century, as San Francisco Convent, this building remained unoccupied for some time after Mendizábal's Disentailment Act. Later, it housed the Malaga Lyceum and then the Malaga Scientific Society and in 1880 the Marîa Cristina Conservatory of Music, until this institution moved in 1971. Inside it has murals by Nogales Sevilla, Sixto Cappa, Martînez de la Vega, Denis Belgrano, Moreno Carbonero, Emilio Ocón, Muñoz Degrain, Ponce, Nogales, Alvarado, Blanco Coris, Merino and Simonet.

In the exterior its most interesting feature is a beautiful Mudejar tower. Today the building, which was built by the architect Enrique Atencia Molina, belongs to the Unicaja Foundation and is often the venue for different cultural events.

In this Lyceum, a true pictorial museum and library of the 19th century, the most distinguished members held their discussions and debates in The Senate Hall, and this was where Pablo Picasso would be baptised with champagne by Martînez de la Vega, after the young artist's successful participation in the National and Provincial Fine Arts Exhibitions of 1897, with his work "Science and Charity".