Behind the scenes

The Ypres Museum has three beautiful cabinets from the seventeenth century. These are luxury items in which wealthy people stored their valuable small objects and documents. They were a speciality of Antwerp and found eager buyers all over Europe.

The Yper Museum has no fewer than 90 works by the Ypres artist Louise De Hem. Some of the works are on permanent display in the museum, but the majority are kept in the depot of the Ypres museums, the DEPOTYZE heritage depot. Especially for the exhibition LOUISE/EDITH. Carried on hands, several works were given a facelift and moved to the Royal Hall.

Ypres artist Louise De Hem is going international! The Ypres Museum is lending her beautiful pastel painting “De Zwarte Kat” (The Black Cat) to the exhibition “El pastel, la renovación de un arte” at the Casa Garriga Nogués art gallery in the heart of Barcelona. The exhibition runs until 5 January 2020.

November marks the 100th anniversary of the death of internationally renowned Ypres artist Louise De Hem. We are taking this opportunity to present her work and life in a major retrospective exhibition entitled “Louise”. Our collection includes no fewer than 90 pastels and oil paintings. Most are in excellent condition, but here and there a little freshening up is needed. This is the case with “Mother and Daughter” from 1902.

The Yper Museum has some beautiful, unique paintings depicting religious scenes, thanks to the rich collection of the almshouses. This has not gone unnoticed by the academic world. On 21 January, Prof. Didier Martens and his assistant Alexandere Dimov visited the depot. Didier Martens is Professor of Art History at the Université Libre de Bruxelles. Alexandre Dimov works at the Centre de recherches Histoire, Arts et Culture des Sociétés anciennes, médiévales et modernes.

The two valuable paintings of Margaret of Austria and her cousin Charles V from the Ypres Museum are attracting international attention. Until 10 January 2021, they will be on display at the Centre Charlemagne, the brand new city museum in Aachen, Germany. The exhibition “The Purchased Emperor - Charles V's Coronation and a Changing World” is currently on display there.

The magical stained-glass window in the council chamber is the icing on the cake of the rebuilt Ypres Cloth Hall. The stained-glass scenes vividly summarise Ypres' medieval past. It looks like a comic strip and is the ideal start to a visit to the Ypres Museum. The stained-glass window is full of unique details. Feast your eyes on the cheeky Ypres cats, vain jesters and the occasional furtive glance where love is blossoming.

In the autumn of 2021, the restoration company Metafose was commissioned by the city of Ypres to restore the weather vane, belfry dragon Margriet and adopted daughter of the Ypres Museum. The Ypres Museum asked this company from Edegem to check a local “urban legend”: is there a message in the dragon's belly or not?