"Children's games" by Bruegel the Elder, which children played 5 centuries ago and are played today

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

For over four and a half centuries painting by Bruegel the Elder "Children's Games"excites the imagination of the audience. She seems to return each of us to the world of childhood, where play was fundamental in a child's life. This work of the Dutch master is considered a kind of encyclopedia of children's entertainment and fun, which, by the way, are very relevant today. And if you consider that the picture was painted in 1560, this means that the games that modern children still play are at least more than five centuries old. Amazing, isn't it?

As noted above, researchers of Bruegel's work have been considering this canvas as a unique catalog of children's games for several centuries, which is quite true. So, a very small creation of the master (118 x 161 cm), the basis of which is not a canvas, but a tree, contained 230 characters actively playing various games. And according to the estimates of specialists, the artist depicted more than a hundred of them in the picture.

However, it goes without saying that the painter did not limit himself to just the usual description of children's entertainment. For Bruegel would not have been Bruegel if he had not laid a double meaning and many mysteries in this canvas. And if we talk about riddles, then first of all it must be said that the very personality of the Dutch painter and graphic artist Pieter Bruegel (1525-1569) was mysterious and ambiguous. By the way, no reliable evidence of what he actually looked like during his lifetime has survived to this day.

The artist did not paint self-portraits, did not leave images of his wife, children, or friends. Historians suggest that he sometimes still portrayed himself among his characters - but no reliable facts confirming this have survived. And the few portraits that were engraved by his colleagues have absolutely no resemblance to each other.

And besides, throughout his life, Bruegel remained "dumb". He did not write articles, did not compose treatises, practically did not leave any correspondence and had no friends who could tell anything about him. Such a reclusive way of life, apparently, was the reason that all the works of the master are full of riddles, secrets, metaphors and allegories. And what prompted the artist to create the canvas under consideration today, art critics can only guess.

However, let us return to "Children's Games" by a completely non-childish artist … You will be surprised that your favorite game was played by children almost five centuries ago. See for yourself: remember a popular game from your childhood, and then try to find it in a painting by Bruegel.

Looking closely, you can see how the kids here play tag and leapfrog, walk on stilts, drive a hoop, make paper mills, spinning tops, shoot each other with a bow; girls play "mothers and daughters", and boys ride on sticks, spin hoops, ride each other, launch tops, fight on sticks, stand on their heads, blow soap bubbles, swim in the river - all the games and entertainment at a glance and do not count. And, curiously, no matter what game we remember from our childhood, we will definitely find it in a painting by a Dutch master in an unchanged version or in a somewhat archaic form.

On the whole picture plane, which seems to be endless, we see children playing everywhere, whose age is from seven to thirteen years old. They are in the windows of houses, and on the river, in the city square, and in small streets and lanes. They completely filled the visible territory of the outskirts of the town. At the same time, the master deliberately chose a high point of view in order to capture as much of the depicted space as possible. By the way, this technique from Bruegel, if you recall his many paintings, was practically unchanged and winning.

So, in order to see everything that happens in the right angle, Bruegel's workshop was most likely located in the area of the second floor. And since it is quite obvious that the master did not write this "encyclopedia of games" in one sitting, then most likely he watched the games of children, their behavior from his window every day. And certainly among them was his eldest daughter Maria, since the sons in the artist's family were born after this painting was painted.

I would like to draw special attention of the viewer to the faces of the heroes themselves. Surprisingly, there is not even a hint of a smile on them. Their fun activities seem like serious pursuits. Children do not seem to play at all, but live an adult life.

And the main reason lies in the fact that the realistic depiction of children, which has entered art over the past couple of centuries, was not practiced at all during the time of Bruegel. Childhood was perceived by society as a transitional period into adulthood, and the child himself was considered an imperfect person.

Children of all ages were even dressed in uncomfortable adult clothes, sewn in a reduced form, since children's fashion did not exist in those days. Therefore, this is how strangely small characters in baggy coarse clothes look in the picture.

So what did children play almost five centuries ago? Let's try to analyze this by examining a fragment of the canvas. In the lower left corner, two girls are enthusiastically playing "grandmothers", and two girls a little higher on the left are playing "mothers and daughters", carefully caring for their dolls. In the center of the fragment we see three boys and a girl standing in front of them with a hammer in her hands. She insistently demands something from them, without receiving any response in return. The boys are busy with their own business: one of them is sitting on the table, holding some kind of propellers in his hands, which he is trying to rotate with a string, the other is calmly blowing soap bubbles, and the third is holding a bird with a red tuft by the tail. And in the upper right corner we can observe a group of children playing the famous "blind man's buff". Oh, how all this is familiar to the modern reader.

And in conclusion, I would like to emphasize that the uniqueness of this creation lies not only in the fact that after several centuries since its writing, it has not lost its relevance, but also in the fact that the action is described in a separate small Dutch town. Indeed, the fact that Bruegel is a Dutch painter, and the action, accordingly, takes place in his homeland, immediately raises the question: how did Bruegel's games end up on the territory of Russia and how they entered the life of each of us living in the modern era ?

But that is another story…

And in continuation of the topic of riddles and secret meanings of Bruegel's works, read: "The Triumph of Death": What is the secret of Bruegel's painting, which has been shaking the minds and imaginations of people for almost 500 years.