The street Madonnas of Antwerp
Antwerp has more than 200 statues of the Virgin Mary on its street corners and façades. They come in all shapes and sizes: colourful or monotone, plain or extravagant, crowned, alone or with the baby Jesus.
Why there are so many
After Antwerp fell to the Spanish in 1585, the city became a stronghold of the Counter-Reformation. Guilds, neighbourhoods and residents put Madonnas on their corners as a public show of Catholic faith, and most of the ones you see today date from the 17th and 18th centuries. For a long time, the lamps lit in front of them were the only street lighting the city had.
The map
The non-profit Kruis en Beeld has indexed every statue in postcode 2000, but never put them on a map. So I'm photographing each one, saving its GPS location and pinning it here. 60 so far, and it's a work in progress: the first 46 I photographed before I planned any of this, so I'll revisit them for better photos and locations.
How to use it
Tap a Madonna on the map, or open the list of all 60. Out walking? Mark the ones you've spotted with "I found this one": they turn green on the map, and your finds stay in this browser.
The whole journey is in I'm mapping all the Madonnas of Antwerp.
