(Antwerp 1629–1675)
A festival on the frozen Scheldt by Antwerp,
signed and dated lower right: ED BIE 1670,
oil on canvas, 121 x 198 cm, framed

Provenance:
Collection of Ferdinand Coosemans, Mayor of Berchem, 1883;
Private collection, France;
sale, Artcurial, Paris, 12 February 2019, lot 334;
where bought by the present owner

Literature:
F. J. van den Branden, Geschiedenis der Antwerpsche Schilderschool, Antwerp 1883, p. 1029

The present scene depicts an ice-fair, replete with fluttering pennants, falling skaters and capering townsfolk, both upon the frozen Scheldt river and arrayed along its quayside. Framed by a port crane on the left and the fortification of Het Steen to the right, it is a vivid depiction of Antwerp life by a native son of the city, Erasmus de Bie. De Bie was trained in the workshop of David Ryckaert III, and specialised in pictures inspired by the city of Antwerp, along with the established Flemish genres of kermesses, market scenes and other popular fetes.

As recorded by the diarist Pierre L’Estoile, in 1607 the ‘great freeze’ led to many similar ice-fairs throughout Europe, but it was in Antwerp that ‘the inhabitants brought their wives and children, erected many tents and pavilions and feasted upon all sorts of victuals’. Sebastian Vrancx (1563-1647) invented a composition based on this episode, and when more than 60 years later a similar chill season struck, de Bie re-interpreted some of Vrancx’s popular motifs for the present canvas, signed by the artist the year of that Great Winter ‘ED BIE 1670’.