Imitator of Hendrick van Steenwyck the Younger, 'Interior of a Church at Night', 1632

It is night-time, and we are looking into the dimly lit apse of a Catholic church. An elaborate metal baptismal font stands on red marble steps in the foreground; the column next to it is a font crane, which supports the font cover. There are still several visitors in the church and the side chapels are brightly lit, although an acolyte is putting out the candles in the chapel on the right.

An inscription on the tombstone in the foreground reads ‘Here lies entombed Henry Steenwyck’, the name of a Flemish painter who specialised in church interiors. As it bears the numbers ‘632’, presumably the last digits of the date 1632, the grave cannot be that of the painter Hendrick Steenwyck the Younger, who died in 1649. The inscription might have been intended as a signature, but the painting’s quality suggests that this is the work of an imitator.