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RUBENS, Pieter Pauwel
Painting: Raising of the Cross
1610 Oil on panel, 460 x 150 cm O.-L. Vrouwekathedraal, Antwerp Rubens painted the triptych for the high altar of Antwerp's church of St Walpurgis, which was demolished in 1817. That explains the inclusion of Amand, Walpurgis and Eligius on the back side of the wings. According to tradition, Bishop Amand founded that church - Antwerp's first - some time around 650. He features on the outside of the wings in the company of Walpurgis, a 8th-century saint, who supposedly lived for several years as a hermitess in the church's crypt, before becoming abbess of the convent she founded in Bavaria. In the right shutter, Rubens placed St Eligius, the blacksmith and bishop. Eligius was the patron saint of Antwerp's blacksmiths, who had their altar at St Walpurgis. Catherine of Alexandria stands in front of him with her martyr's sword and palm branch. The prominent position she is given in the altarpiece no doubt had something to do with a special devotion in the church, perhaps a confraternity of St Catherine, of which, however, no details are known. , Artist: RUBENS, Pieter Pauwel , Raising of the Cross: Sts Amand and Walpurgis , 1601-1650 , Flemish , painting , religious
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