I can’t stop thinking about that Bruegel exhibition. Now I wish that I had bought the catalogue first, read it from cover to cover, and then seen the show. Twice.
Knowing what I know now, I wouldn’t have spent time looking at the sketches or the prints — they are handsomely reproduced in the catalogue. I would have spent the whole time studing the paintings. And not taken my camera along on day two.
The camera had its advantages, though. I now have a ton of detailed images from Dulle Grillet and The Triumph of Death (the image of Mad Meg in the catalogue is pretty messed up, since they’ve managed to put her face on a two-page spread right where the staples are. But in general it’s still a nice book). And some of the more interesting pictures I took are the ones which show a bit of the crowd, as well…
The Battle Between Carnival And Lent
On the day I visited, it was a pretty old crowd. White haired codgers like myself, for the most part. I’m sure the school parties had been hustled through earlier in the day. But the oldsters were all having a good old time with the Elder’s paitings.
The Triumph of Death
Check out the expressions of those viewing The Triumph of Death. The man in front seems appropriately perturbed, but the people behind him look rapt with delight! Or fascination. While this view of the Rotterdam Tower of Babel becomes for me even more haunting and intimidating seen over the shoulders of others…
The Tower of Babel
It turns out that Gratz, home of one of the two divergent copies of The Triumph of Death, which I mentioned in the last post, is not far from Vienna, in another museum filled with extraordinary stuff. So I have a new excuse to visit Austria, when I next pay a visit to my mum…
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