vince’s ear

You can’t begin to describe Pieter Bruegel the Elder and his amazing art in one or two posts. The posts The Wintry Scenes of Pieter Bruegel and The Triumph of Death described two of the painter’s masterpieces. But there is so much more to Bruegel, with so many interesting stories being played out across towns, villages, and countrysides of the Netherlands during the Renaissance.

One of the few times my high school art teacher gave us any freedom was when we had to use linear perspective to draw a street with houses on either side and a horseman in the center. Everyone else copied the original to the t, but when my teacher allowed me to add characters to the scene, it was time to unleash the Bruegel fury. I had always admired the packed peasant streets of Bruegel’s towns such as Children’s Games, and Netherlandish Proverbs (above), so I drew all kinds of people hanging out of windows, playing tricks one each other, playing games or fighting, etc. You know, the kind of things that make an ordinarily plain and simple landscape entertaining and full of life.

Pieter Bruegel painted Netherlandish Proverbs early in his career and shows a highly imaginative composition illustrating the foolishness of life with 100 identifiable proverbs. He does this in such a way as to show each proverb as part of a larger scene, which read literally would be quite the chaotic landscape. Each adage, many of which are still used today, blends right into the next. If you didn’t know it was a painting full of metaphors and folk wisdoms, you might just think it was a crazy, topsy-turvy world unfolding before your eyes, not dissimilar to many of Bruegel’s other paintings.

Some Proverbs

The sow pulls the bung- Negligence will be rewarded with disaster.

It depends on the fall of the cards- It is up to chance.

The world is turned upside down- Everything is the opposite of what it should be.

Leave at least one egg in the nest- Always have something in reserve.

The roof has lathes/ the walls have ears- Someone could be listening.

To have the roof tiled with tarts- To be living in the lap of luxury/ abundance. (The Land of Cockaigne)

To be a hen feeler- To count one’s chickens before they hatch.

They both shit in the same hole- They are in agreement.

To throw one’s money in the water- To waste one’s money.

Big fish eat the little fish.

To have fire in one hand, water in the other- To be two-faced and stir up trouble.

Many parts have more than one meaning:

To Bang one’s head against a brick wall - To try to achieve something impossible. One foot shod, the other bare- Balance is paramount.

To bell the cat- To be indiscreet about plans that should be secret. Armed to the teeth- Heavily armed. To be an iron biter- To be indiscreet/boastful.

To have a toothache behind the ears- To be a malingerer. To be pissing against the moon- To waste one’s time on a futile endeavor. Here hangs the pot- It is the opposite of what it should be.

Where the gate is open, the pigs will run to the corn- Carelessness breeds disaster. When the corn is less, the pigs are more- If one person gains, then another must lose (no free lunch). To run like one’s backside is on fire- To be in great distress. He who eats fire, shits sparks- Do not be surprised of the outcome of a dangerous venture.

Technorati Tags: proverbs, renaissance, painting, witticisms, sayings, folklore

The full list at wikipedia.