The Convent of Santa Clara has been home to a cloistered community of Poor Clare nuns since 1639. Behind the heavy doors on Calle Calvo, a small museum offers a glimpse into the parallel world of monastic Sucre — colonial paintings (including a Bernardo Bitti, the great Italian-trained painter of the Andean baroque), gilt altars, religious vestments embroidered with silver thread, and a 17th-century pipe organ said to be the oldest working organ in South America.
A handful of nuns still live in the closed half of the convent, and the museum visit is led by a guide who explains the rules of cloistered life. Choir nuns once watched mass from behind the grilled wooden screen at the back of the church, hidden from the public. The Bach concerts held here every spring as part of the Festival Internacional de Música Renacentista y Barroca Americana are unforgettable; the acoustics are extraordinary.