The stained glass windows were an excellent pro-Hapsburg propaganda tool for Charles V, who saw the monumental windows in this important cathedral in Brussels as a way of underlining and legitimizing his power in the Flemish region. The windows depict Charles’ powerful forebears and family, to whom he owed his great empire. The use of typical renaissance forms like triumphal arches links Charles V with the mighty emperors of classical antiquity, but also reminds us of the sovereign’s ‘joyful entries’.
The stained glass window on which Charles V himself was depicted is one of the three windows from the original series of seven that has not survived. The exhibition will also shed light on these lost windows as well as on two other stained glass windows in the church from the same period.