Willem Lepelstraat (Dancing Chocolate)

“The majority of the statues in our care are Madonnas, but there are also some other saints, such as Saint Roch against the side wall of the restaurant Dansing Chocola. Rochus is a plague saint who had to protect the people of Antwerp from the disease. There are three statues of Rochus in the city. This statue dates from 1866. In this depiction, we see how Rochus points to a plague sore on his bare right knee.”

“This statue was very recently restored. At the end of September 2024, it was reinstalled. Prior to that, it was in poor condition and moreover, the niche where the statue stands had almost become invisible due to the dense foliage. In consultation with the owner of the property, the climbing plants were pruned.”

The restoration of the statue itself was carried out, as always, by a certified restorer. “Today, restoration is done with the utmost care. That wasn’t always the case. We have come across statues that had no less than forty layers of paint in all sorts of colors. Sometimes, over the years, a statue was so often repainted that the head of Jesus had become a cauliflower.”

Hanna Van Thienen