Feast of Saint George

Gillis Mostaert, who was the twin brother of Frans Mostaert and a pupil of Jan Mandijn of Antwerp, was a prolific and very popular artist in his time. Very few of his works are still known today, however. Mostaert was a contemporary of Pieter Brueghel the Elder and painted according to his tradition. The Feast of St George is a good example of this. This fair was held in the week of the Feast of St George and was extremely popular for many years. Tribute was paid to St George as a helper in times of need and as the patron saint of knights and archers. We can see that the painting refers to these village festivities by the flag near the tavern on the right of the panel, which was probably the regular meeting place of the archers gild. In the foreground we see a group of market vendors extolling the virtues of their wares. In the centre background we see a man and a woman beating one another. In addition to being a rich source of information about the morals and customs of the time, a genre work like this also has a moral message: alcoholism and debauched behaviour often result in violence and moral decay.