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Museum Mayer v.d.Bergh
Maagdenhuis

Strolling to the Carolus Borromeus church

Rockoxhuis- Rubens tomb at St.Jacobskerk

Cogels-Osylei area, unique in the world (1)

Cogels Osy area, unique in the world (2)

You want to see great class art? Just walk to the Lange Gasthuisstraat 19 and enter the MUSEUM MAYER VAN DEN BERGH.

In this world there are some collectors who are touched by “grace”: Fritz Mayer van den Bergh, who died in 1901, 43 years old, was one of them. After his death, his mother built this jewel of a house in neo-gothic to preserve his precious collection of medieval art and Renaissance. She hired an Antwerp architect, J.Hertogs, for the job. Even empty, this edifice merits a visit, if not only for its multi-coloured marble fireplaces but also for its brocaded hangings and its richly sculpted wainscoting!
The museum opened in 1924. Private property until 1951, the museum was bought by the city.

Take your time because this collection equals manyothers in National museums You can only see art of the highest quality, famous names were not important for Mayer van den Bergh. The collection assembles 3098 art objects and 2,000 medals and coins. Superb retables of the Passion skirt the statues of Evangelists. The top items of the museums are without any contest

the two original Pieter Breughel the Elder paintings: “De Dulle Griet” and the “Twelve Proverbs”. This Dulle Griet painting, maybe one of the most important in the world was bought by Mayer van den Bergh in a sale of a Koln for three times nothing. Breughel was not so much appreciated at that time but Mayer understood right away the quality of the painting. He was a very keen collector and Antwerp owes him a lot.


De Dulle Griet by P.Breughel the Elder	The Twelve Proverbs by P.Breughel the Elder

It’s an extraordinary representation and allegory of Madness, Vice and Stupidity, and above all, the denunciation of the horrors of the Spanish Inquisition. You see a terrifying mad woman with a hell’s background: I never saw a more realistic and anguishing evocation of the horrors of war. Next to it “The Twelve Proverbs”. In the same room and floor works of Pourbus, Van Orley, Frans Hals, Luc Devos, David Teniers, Joos van Cleve and Jacob Jordaens. Stop a moment is hall 4 to admire the “Calvary” triptych of Quinten Metsys (the man of the well in front of the cathedral). For the rest, juts wander through the house and admire the huge collection of paintings, sculptures, etchings, manuscripts, coins….
Continue the Lange Gasthuisstraat to no. 33. You are in front of the “MAAGDENHUIS” (Virgin house).This ancient house that once was an orphanage for girls created in 1552 has a façade of the 17th century. A nice interior courtyard. The museum contains heart-rending testimonies of the epoch that this was an orphanage (16th-17th century) particularly the small scale model showing how abandoned babies were placed in a sort of drawer located in the wall and pushed to the interior. The mother often left a play card or half of it with the baby for later identification, hoping that the two parts of the card will match when she will return to fetch her child.

There is a display-window showing a few of these cards, or sometimes the two parts assembled. In the same museum you can see more works of Rubens, Van Dijck, Jordaens, Van Veen. And Antwerp and Dutch ceramics….The highlight of the collection is the coloured tin glazed pottery of the 16th century.
The same entrance ticket allows you to visit the Saint-Elisabeth Chapel of the 15th and the interior (17th) of the Elzenveld, today a centre of exhibitions and conferences.

Brussels	Antwerp	Ghent	Bruges
ANTWERP-Museum Mayer van den Bergh-Maagdenhuis (House of the Virgins)