#MECHELEN

[hopefulkidshark]

Mechelen City Hall, Mechelen, Belgium: Mechelen town hall on the Grote Markt consists of two parts: the cloth hall with unfinished belfry and the Palace of the Great Council. The cloth trade went into decline in the 14th century and there wasn't the money to complete the building. For two hundred years the belfry was no more than a shell, until it was eventually provided with a temporary roof in the 16th century. Wikipedia

[minarachelle]

Mechelen, Belgium - 2022

[tobebuild]

Het Predikheren, Mechelen Korteknie Stuhlmacher Architecten, Callebaut Architecten 2024 (reconstruction) Maurice Tjon a Tham

[de-enige-echte-richard]

[heritagebrowser]

Mechelen was from the late middle ages till the baroque period a centre of woodsculpting. So in this city you can find many top noch furnitures, wood carvings and woodsculptures. Here i present to you the pulpit of the Saint-Peter-and-Paul church (Sint-Pieter-en-Pauluskerk) in Mechelen, Belgium.

The Saint Peter and Paul Church is a former Jesuit church on the Veemarkt in Mechelen. The pulpit, a work by Hendrik Frans Verbruggen (ca. 1700), shows in the form of allegorical figures the spread of the Faith across four continents by the Jesuit Francis Xavier.

The base is a globe resting on crawlers; The globe contains the four then known continents, in the form of persons and characteristic animals:

America: the Indian, turtle and snake

Europa: the young woman with the horn of abundance (cornucopia), a sceptre, a book and a doe

Asia: the woman with a turban and the leopard

Africa: the black one covered with elephant skin, and the crocodile.

Some background on the sculptor Hendrik Frans Verbruggen:

He was born into a family that produced a number of prominent sculptors in the 17th and 18th centuries who were mainly active in Antwerp. His father, the sculptor Pieter Verbruggen, was one of the most important representatives of the Flemish High Baroque in sculpture. The father had been apprenticed to Erasmus Quellinus I, who himself was the founder of a prominent family of sculptors. The father was married to the daughter of his teacher Erasmus Quellinus. From this marriage Hendrik Frans Verbruggen was born. His brother Pieter Verbruggen also became a sculptor and worked in his father's studio.

He was initially trained by his father. However, he is said to have started his career with the book illuminator Jan Ruyselinck. It cannot be ruled out that after his education, like his brother Pieter, he first made a trip to Italy. This journey is not documented. The influence of the Italian sculptor Gianlorenzo Bernini on his work could also be explained by the fact that he used drawings after Bernini's works and antique sculptures that his brother made in Rome as a source of inspiration.

He became a master sculptor with the Antwerp Guild of Saint Luke in 1682. That year he married Susanna Verhulst. He became dean of the Guild of Saint Luke in 1689. In 1713 he went bankrupt, but this did not prevent him from completing existing assignments.

[chantssecrets]

Margaret of Austria. This painting comes from the studio of the court painter Bernard van Orley, who made several portraits of Margaret.

[huariqueje]

Le quai des poissonniers, Malines   -   Henri Le Sidaner , 1931.

French,   1862-1939  

Oil on panel , 60 x 73 cm    6 3/4 x 9 1/8 in

[postcard-from-the-past]

Belgian soldiers digging up tranches by Mechelen during the First World War, Belgium

Belgian vintage postcard

[blackandwhiteproductions]

Wisent European Bison at Zoo Planckendael in Mechelen

[gentlemanpixelator]

Mechelen. Hoofdkerk Sint Rombaut.

Malines. La Cathédrale Saint-Rombaut.

[nikkimayprosetiko]

[minarachelle]

Mechelen, Belgium - 2022

[beautiful-belgium]

Holiday photo of the Boske family on the Grand-Place in Malines. Year: 1935 - 1940.

[de-enige-echte-richard]

[solarioose]

[v-o-i-d]