About the Painting

Working in the aftermath of the reformation, Bruegel separated his landscapes from long-standing iconographic tradition. Iconographic tradition, in this case, means the tradition of using holy icons in one’sartwork. By separating the icons from the landscape Bruegel focuses almost solely on the scenery itself, providing detailed depictions of the countryside. No saints can be found in The Harvesters, and the church is hidden behind the foliage of the tree. In this late summer depiction, a ripe field of wheat has been partially cut and stacked. In the foreground, a group of peasants pause in their work, taking a picnic in the shade of a pear tree. They sit atop stacks of grain, and are eating bread and pears and drinking bowls of milk. Humorously, two of the peasants gaze out at the audience as they eat, almost as if they are in a zoo. Behind and to the left of them, the work continues. A couple gathers wheat into bundles and ties them together. Three men cut the stalks with their scythes. Women make their way through a corridor and into the field, carrying stacks of grain on their shoulders. Over the hills, the scene continues to unfurl. A valley is animated with scenes of village life. Children play with a dead goose while others play a different game. Behind the village is another immense wheat field, and a bay that seems to extend forever. The objects further in the background disappear into the atmospheric haze. Two thirds of the painting is filled with a yellowish paint, conveying the heat of late summer.

A close study of the paint layer also highlights Bruegel’s talent as an artist. In general, the layering structure is simple, consisting of very few layers of paint. However, Bruegel was able to achieve depth and vibrancy within a single layer of paint through dynamic brushwork. The deep recession of the wheat field was created by thickly stippling pale yellow paint onto the panel with a stiff paintbrush, giving it an impression of expansive space and a gentle breeze. Stippling refers to the process of covering an area with dots. The simplicity of such a paint structure allowed Bruegel to paint more quickly.When describing clothing, he used a technique of wet-in-wet with some impasto. Wet-in-wet refers to adding wet paint on top of wet paint, and impasto is the technique of applying paint as thickly as paste. Beyond the various applications of the brush, Bruegel also used less conventional methods of applying paint. In a few instances, he incised wet paint using a blunt instrument, potentially the end of a brush. The leaves of the largest trees seem to have been applied with something else other than a brush, possibly a sponge. There is even one instance of Bruegel painting with his fingers. A wisp of green foliage glimpsed through the path in the wheat field was created by a fingerprint.