Few paintings by Pieter Bruegel the Elder survive, so seeing more than a couple together is quite a treat. How about half a dozen, then? Or ten? Or more? Like in the outstanding Bruegel collection at the Kunsthistorisches Museum (KHM).
- Museum owns 12 Bruegel paintings
- By far the largest global collection
- Includes The Tower of Babel
- On display in Saal X of the picture galleries
- Book your KHM museum tickets*
- See also:
More Bruegels than anywhere
(The Bruegel Saal at the museum; press photo © KHM-Museumsverband)
Pieter Bruegel the Elder died in 1569, and experts regard him as a pioneer of genre painting and a superstar of the Renaissance.
So one of the more exciting moments in my reporting life was experiencing the fabulous 2018/2019 Bruegel exhibition at the Kunsthistorisches Museum (KHM).
To say the event proved popular would be an understatement, with exhibition visitors desperately crowding around for a small glimpse of Bruegel’s genius.
Ironically, you can view many of the works on display back then in relative peace and quiet today, since the KHM has the globe’s biggest and most important collection of Bruegel’s paintings.
(Peasant Dance, Pieter Bruegel the Elder (c. 1525/30 – 1569), c. 1568, oak panel, 114 × 164 cm, Kunsthistorisches Museum Vienna, Picture Gallery; © KHM-Museumsverband)
Only around 45 such paintings remain in the world, which adds to the significance of the 12 owned by the KHM. The Vienna works are:
- Children’s Games (1560)
- The Tower of Babel (1563 and possibly Bruegel’s most famous creation)
- The Procession to Calvary (1564)
- The Conversion of Paul (1567)
- The Return of the Herd (1565)
- The Hunters in the Snow (1565): my personal favourite
- The Gloomy Day (1565)
- The Peasant and the Nest Robber (1568)
- The Peasant Wedding (1568)
- The Peasant Dance (1568)
- The Suicide of Saul (1562)
- The Fight between Carnival and Lent (1559)
I saw the first ten on a recent visit to the museum’s picture galleries (and might simply have missed the other two). Enjoy my impressions with a grain of salt, as I own to no artistic expertise…
If you stand in the middle and take in the whole gallery, it feels barely credible that Bruegel masterpieces surround you, given their scarcity.
Take a closer look at the paintings, and the detail soon absorbs your attention; the squeak of visitor feet on wooden floors fades to nothing, and Bruegel often convinces you this is not a painting from his imagination, but a documentation or a snapshot of a real scene.
This feeling of capturing a moment in time seemed strongest in The Procession to Calvary, which pictures the crowds around Jesus Christ as he carries the cross. Guards deal with a brawling couple, for example, momentarily distracting the onlookers from Christ’s fate.
A similar feeling arose from The Conversion of Paul through the rips in a soldier’s tunic and the interactions between people (as if unaware they’re being captured for posterity).
(Hunters in the Snow, Pieter Bruegel the Elder (c. 1525/30 – 1569), 1565, oak panel, 117 × 162 cm; Kunsthistorisches Museum Vienna, Picture Gallery; © KHM-Museumsverband)
In other paintings, it’s all about the minutiae.
Like the bowed heads of tired men returning home in The Hunters in the Snow, which takes one of the places on my list of top suggestions for the museum. I sometimes pass the time conjuring up stories about the figures featured in the work.
Or the bare treetops in The Gloomy Day, the evocation of season through colour in The Return of the Herd, and the broken jug handle in The Peasant Dance.
Or the myriad of scenes in Children’s Games, with many games waking memories of my own childhood some 450 years after Bruegel put down his brush.
And then, of course, we have the questions raised by The Peasant Wedding, acquired as part of the collection of Archduke Leopold Wilhelm (1614 – 1662), younger brother of Emperor Ferdinand III.
Who is the well-dressed man seated at the end of the wedding table? What food is in the bowls on the serving tray? And where did that leg come from?
(Peasant Wedding; Pieter Bruegel the Elder (c. 1525/30 – 1569); c. 1567, oak panel, 114 × 164 cm; Kunsthistorisches Museum Vienna, Picture Gallery; © KHM-Museumsverband)
The bottom right of the picture appears to show an extra leg under that serving tray. Either the man carrying the tray has three legs (unlikely) or the man handing out the plates is a contortionist (possible).
Is it a hidden person? A leftover from an earlier version of the painting? A space filler? A deliberate attempt to challenge the observer to find the right owner of the foot and draw his or her eyes up the painting? Or just Bruegel’s little joke?
Nobody seems to know, but – intriguingly – a copy of the painting by his son (Pieter Brueghel the Younger1) omits this third leg.
The Bruegel gallery begins close to the end of the galleries used for special exhibitions. So an adjacent pop-up shop has a selection of items with motifs matching both.
You also find themed souvenirs, publications and more in the main KHM museum store, of course, should you wish to take some Dutch/Flemish magic home with you.
Where to see the Bruegels
Follow the instructions for finding the Kunsthistorisches Museum. Then head for the picture galleries (“Gemäldegalerie”). You want Gallery 10 (Saal X), which is also known, unsurprisingly, as the “Bruegel Saal”.
If you can’t make it to Vienna in person, then a cooperation with Visit Flanders offers an online alternative: a virtual 3D tour through the gallery with background information on Bruegel and his paintings, as well as the chance to get up even closer than you might in the museum..
1I’ve learned the Bruegel family name has inconsistent spelling.