Musse Old Masters, Brussels

Bruegel paintings can seem to have spanned 100 years in their creation, but it is simply that there was more than one Bruegel painting them, and that makes it a bit confusing.  Pieter Bruegel the Elder (1525-1569), was an exceptionally talented artist.  He apprenticed in Antwerp under Pieter Coecke van Aelst, who had been a court painter to Charles V.  Coecke van Aelst also became his father-in-law, when he married his daughter.  Once Bruegel the Elder had completed his apprenticeship he travelled to Italy, which was the custom for painters of the 16th Century. A few of his works are today housed in the Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium, in the Musee Old Masters Museum.  While best known for his depictions of the life of peasants, not all of his paintings exhibit reality.

It is easy to assume that Pieter Bruegel the Elder taught his two sons how to paint, especially when Pieter Bruegel the Younger not only made copies of his fathers works, but created his own in the same style, so much so that they can be difficult to distinguish. However, the Elder Bruegel died around 45 years of age, when his sons were only 1 and 5 years old. We don’t know where they learned the art of painting, but they did come from a family of painters and were able to continue the business. 

Pieter Brueghel the Younger painted repetitions of his father’s works, and more than 40 copies of some of the paintings were recorded as having been created.  With no other means of replicating, it made sense to be able to reproduce the art of his father. Pieter Bruegel the Younger lived into his seventies, and produced almost 1,000 known paintings in total throughout his career. He also produced his own paintings, and further developed peasant subjects and landscapes. 

The Royal Museum of Fine Arts of Belgium, in Brussels, holds the second largest collection of Peiter Bruegel the Elder’s works.  The largest collection is held in Vienna. There are also a dozen works there by Bruegel’s sons -  Pieter Bruegel the Younger, and Jan Bruegel the Elder, who’s primary focus was on still-life, a genre that was previously unknown at his time.