"Zondag aan de Leie" by Frits Van den Berghe

"Zondag aan de Leie" by Frits Van den Berghe is a painting about the trip of the three young monastery brothers on a quiet Sunday afternoon in the village of Drongen in 1924. Van den Berghe depicted the brothers as they should be, with three. The monastic order had an old and inflexible motto that sounded locally like this: "Noeit me twieen, wriee little alliene, at least with drive". Young monastics were only allowed outside the abbey walls in groups of three. Only you can do something that no one knows anything about. You can always agree on something between the two of you. But with three you won't try much because you always run the risk of a third playing snitch.

Expressionist Frits Van den Berghe had a great sense of delicate humour. Three seemingly completely separate worlds meet on the banks of the Lys on a Sunday. The décor is that of the south side of the abbey and the adjacent parish church of Drongen. The monumental abbey complex is located just past a meander of the Leie, where the Pont bridge gives access to the old Drongen village square. The church tower, also called pepperbus because of its octagonal shape, is that of the abbey church

"Zondag aan de Leie" by Frits Van den Berghe hangs in the Royal Museum of Fine Arts in Brussels.

Dromos