The interior of a church with a sermon in progress, a christening party in the foreground

Van Delen devoted his painting entirely to architectural subjects. He is best known for his interiors and views of palaces, which borrow heavily from the graphic work of Hans and Paul Vredeman de Vries, and his church interiors, such as the present work, which draw on the tradition of Hendrick van Steenwijck. For the earliest of the latter type (for example that of 1627 in the Hermitage, St. Petersburg) he turned to the print by Johannes van Londerseel after a painting by Hendrick Aertsn (d. Gdansk, 1603) as a point of departure. Other sources for his preferred Gothic style of church architecture may have been the work of the Antwerp architectural painters, although, Van Delen softened their rigid tunnel perspective by employing intricate compositions that more subtly suggest a sense of depth. His approach seems closer to that adopted by his contemporary Bartholomeus van Bassen (for example that sold, Sotheby's, London, 30 October 1996, lot 110); indeed some of Van Bassen's works may have served as models for the interior views that Van Delen produced from 1628.