Pieter Bruegel the Elder was astonishingly independent of the dominant artistic interests during his time, despite his taking the requisite journey to Italy for purposes of study. He deliberately revived the late Gothic style of Hieronymus Bosch as the point of departure from Italian mannerism for his own highly complex and original art.
The Dutch biographer Karel van Mander, who wrote in 1604, was the one major source of information concerning Pieter Bruegel the Elder. Karel was a near-contemporary of Pieter. He claims that Pieter was born in a town of the same name near Breda on the modern Dutch-Belgian border.
Pieter Bruegel the Elder went to Italy between 1552 and 1553, presumably by way of France. He met the miniaturist Giulio Clovio, on his visit to Rome. Giulio listed three paintings by Pieter in his will of 1578. However, the paintings, which apparently consisted of landscapes, did not survive the test of time.
There is evidence to suggest that Pieter Bruegel the Elder was attempting to substitute a new and moral eschatology for the traditional view of the Christian cosmos of Bosch in his series of engravings, Seven Deadly Sins. This was despite of efforts to dismiss the engravings as fascinating drolleries.
The 1959 Combat of Carnival and Lent, one of the earliest signed and dated painting of Pieter Bruegel the Elder, the influence of Hieronymus Bosch was still strongly felt. Derivatives from the earlier Dutch master included the high-horizoned landscape, the decorative surface patterning and many of the iconographic details.
The Dulle Griet of 1562 was still related to the style of Hieronymus Bosch. However it was unlike the works of Hieronymus in the sense that it was not intended as a moral sermon against the depravity of the world but rather as a recognition of evil in it. This capacity to see evil as inseparable from the human condition was carried over into the Triumph of Death, another Pieter Bruegel painting of the same year.
The Dutch biographer Karel van Mander, who wrote in 1604, was the one major source of information concerning Pieter Bruegel the Elder. Karel was a near-contemporary of Pieter. He claims that Pieter was born in a town of the same name near Breda on the modern Dutch-Belgian border.
Pieter Bruegel the Elder went to Italy between 1552 and 1553, presumably by way of France. He met the miniaturist Giulio Clovio, on his visit to Rome. Giulio listed three paintings by Pieter in his will of 1578. However, the paintings, which apparently consisted of landscapes, did not survive the test of time.
There is evidence to suggest that Pieter Bruegel the Elder was attempting to substitute a new and moral eschatology for the traditional view of the Christian cosmos of Bosch in his series of engravings, Seven Deadly Sins. This was despite of efforts to dismiss the engravings as fascinating drolleries.
The 1959 Combat of Carnival and Lent, one of the earliest signed and dated painting of Pieter Bruegel the Elder, the influence of Hieronymus Bosch was still strongly felt. Derivatives from the earlier Dutch master included the high-horizoned landscape, the decorative surface patterning and many of the iconographic details.
The Dulle Griet of 1562 was still related to the style of Hieronymus Bosch. However it was unlike the works of Hieronymus in the sense that it was not intended as a moral sermon against the depravity of the world but rather as a recognition of evil in it. This capacity to see evil as inseparable from the human condition was carried over into the Triumph of Death, another Pieter Bruegel painting of the same year.
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