Sint-Pauluskerk in Antwerp.

Sint-Pauluskerk (St Paul’s Church) in Antwerp is an exceptional architectural synthesis of late Gothic and Baroque, reflecting the city’s shifting artistic and devotional culture across three centuries. Construction began in 1517 in the Brabantine Gothic style, noted for its comparatively restrained architectural ornament. Yet, even without elaborate stone carving, Antwerp’s parish and monastic churches were richly embellished over time with paintings, sculpture, and liturgical furnishings — works that grew into collective visual statements of civic pride and religious devotion. The church’s 18th-century Calvary Garden, an extensive ensemble of outdoor Baroque sculpture, remains a striking reminder of its Dominican monastic origins and of the performative, processional character of Counter-Reformation piety.

The interior preserves one of the most remarkable concentrations of Baroque painting and sculpture in Antwerp. These works exemplify the grandeur and affective power of Catholic Baroque art, intended to move the viewer to awe and devotion through theatrical composition, dramatic light, and heightened naturalism. Notable among the original holdings were Peter Paul Rubens’s (1577–1640) Disputa of the Blessed Sacrament and The Flagellation of Christ; Antoon van Dyck’s (1599–1641) The Carrying of Christ; and major works by Jacob Jordaens (1593–1678) — all pivotal examples of the Antwerp School’s mastery of dynamic figuration and chiaroscuro. The marble high altar, designed by Frans van Sterbeeck (dates unknown) and executed by Pieter Verbruggen I (1615–1686) and Pieter Verbruggen II (1648–1691), represents one of the city’s finest integrations of architecture and sculpture.

Patronage at St Paul’s was unusually collaborative: Rubens and other leading artists not only contributed their own work but also joined in financing acquisitions. Most celebrated among these was Caravaggio’s (1571–1610) Madonna del Rosario, purchased for the altar of the Holy Rosary. This painting, a rare example of Caravaggio’s work in the Southern Netherlands, was claimed in the eighteenth century by Emperor Joseph II of Austria (1741–1790) and is now in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna.

The turbulence of the late eighteenth century brought severe losses. Revolutionary confiscations and Austrian requisitions saw much of the church’s artistic patrimony dispersed. Rubens’s The Great Vision of Saint Dominic is now in the Musée des Beaux-Arts, Lyon, while Theodoor Boeyermans’s (1620–1678) The Martyrdom of Saint Paul resides in the Église de la Madeleine, Aix-en-Provence.