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Beyond its role as a place of worship, Santa Teresa preserves evidence of the wealth, craftsmanship and enclosed life of Erice's Carmelite community. Surviving artworks and objects, now divided between the church and local museums, help reconstruct a religious complex substantially altered after its closure.

The Badalucco foundation

The monastery owed its existence to the Badalucco family. Giuseppe Badalucco had stipulated that, if his family left no direct heirs, his estate should be used to establish a Carmelite monastery. His descendants Tommaso and Maria Badalucco, the last representatives of the family, fulfilled that intention in 1671 by adapting their own palazzo for the new religious community.

The monastery was dedicated to Saint Teresa of Ávila, reformer of the Carmelite order. When the first Discalced Carmelite nuns entered in 1701, the foundation had an annual income exceeding 600 scudi, making it one of the wealthiest monasteries in Erice.

Maria Badalucco maintained a close connection with the foundation. An inscription in the sanctuary records the transfer of her remains from the Church of the Carmine to the monastery.

Art and decoration

The single-nave interior retains an 18th-century floor of Neapolitan maiolica, distinguished by the delicacy of its colours. The principal altar was once particularly elaborate, decorated with silver, mirrors and stucco. In 1744 Pietro Dell'Orto created its stucco ornamentation and four allegorical figures representing Justice, Hope, Faith and Prudence, displaying a clear Serpottian influence.

The side altars included works donated by Maria Badalucco. A Saint John of the Cross by Domenico La Bruna originally occupied the first altar on the left, while another altar held a Crucifix also given by her. Other furnishings included a tufa statue of Saint Joseph with the Christ Child and a painting of Our Lady of Mount Carmel from Palermo. The organ dates from 1850 and the pulpit from 1853.

Not everything survived in the church. Parts of the principal altar, including its silver-and-mirror ciborium and the decorated tabernacle door, are preserved in the collections of the Chiesa Matrice.

Artworks dispersed after the monastery closed

Following the suppression of the monastery, its liturgical objects and artworks were distributed among other churches and collections in Erice.

An early 18th-century embroidered paliotto, centred on an image of Saint Teresa and the symbolic pelican feeding its young, can now be seen in the Museo della Chiesa Madre. It had previously been transferred to the Church of San Cataldo with other Carmelite vestments.

Several paintings from Santa Teresa entered the collections of the Museo Civico Antonio Cordici. Among them is Domenico La Bruna's 18th-century Holy Family, which is displayed in the museum. Other paintings originating from the church and monastery are held in its collections.

The Carmelite campane

Santa Teresa was particularly known for an unusual form of convent craftsmanship. Alongside prayer and embroidery, the enclosed Carmelite nuns made elaborate objects known as campane: compositions of figures, flowers and miniature decorations made from ceroplastic materials and protected beneath glass domes.

The nuns worked a delicate mixture based on starch and gum arabic, forming it into thin sheets from which individual petals, leaves and miniature figures could be fashioned. The tradition continued for generations and survived into the 20th century through the last Carmelites of Santa Teresa, Suor Adriana Barbera and Suor Benedetta Calamusa. After leaving Santa Teresa, the two nuns continued producing these objects at San Carlo.

Examples of the distinctive Ericine campane survive in the Museo Civico Antonio Cordici and in private collections, preserving a material record of a craft once closely associated with the Carmelite community of Santa Teresa.