On a hot summer day, golden wheat stalks tower over a vast countryside. Engaging in social interaction, harvester hands hold heavy, sharp scythes cutting crops. In 1565, back-breaking life in Belgium around Antwerp wasn’t easy. Imagine traveling back in time back to a lifestyle from the past. The thought itself seems difficult, almost impossible, yet there’s a medium that shows us the way. Art transcends language and time. Over the course of history, art has evolved, influenced by historical events, technology and culture.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art always attracts a large audience. International crowds gather daily on the Acropolis façade’s four-blocks long, wide steps taking photos. The fashion world holds the prestigious annual Met Gala here every spring. Visitors have an opportunity to see the world’s masterpieces. There are several exquisite treasures with over two million pieces of art. Within these walls, knights in shining armor do exist.
What you won’t find here is a 20-foot tall, pop-up store portrait of Vincent van Gogh. Many cities are currently overwhelmed by these popular tourist traps featuring floor-to-ceiling digital imagery. Unsuspecting customers are exploited with expensive entrance fees. Capitalizing on the trendy bombardment; television drug commercials are even in on the act. One prescription ad features a couple taking a relative with cognitive memory issues to see a show. Of course, it’s clear we need effective treatments for Alzheimer’s as loved ones provide support. As a party of relatives observe an over-the-top digital fireworks wall, a subpar cover version of “Here Comes the Sun” plays. Who’s in charge of marketing?
Artwork interpretation is diverse, subjective, and ever-changing. Salvador Dali was famous for soft, melting clocks. The Persistence of Memory was a popular 1970s poster. “You’ve got just what I need” Wayfair, sells a framed reproduction for $106.99. When I finally saw the original at the Met, I stood on my toes to catch a glimpse of a darkish 9.5”x13” canvas. Dali was a well-known prankster. My dollar postcard from the gift shop sufficed as a budget reminder. The card remained on a refrigerator door throughout art school.
Recently at the Met, I was surprised entering an empty gallery. With the exception of a few secular portraits, early Netherlandish works in the European Paintings collection are religious in nature. One famous painting immediately caught my eye. Essays on The Harvesters strike similar chords; each finding their own subtleties.
Focused on 16th-century life, the panoramic view is simple, yet complex. The Harvesters (1565) is an oil on wood by Flemish artist Pieter Bruegel the Elder. Grabbing a few moments of time to study an Old Master work was a delight. It’s hard to believe human hands could produce such precision craftsmanship. The painting invites us to observe and explore the communal efforts of wheat harvesters laboring under a late August sun. A busy farming community works together hand-in-hand. Daily Art called it “mortal drama through the highest levels of artistic sophistication.”
In the foreground, peasants are taking a lunch break. They sip bowels of porridge and eat bread. Everyone is sharing. A lazy someone catches a snooze in the shade. A shift in focus to the far upper right, reveals a subtle shrine of faith, an obscured church steeple with a cross. Next to a house on a dirt road, locals walk around farmland with cows and oxen. The landscape is painstakingly detailed. Trees and plants the size of dimes to pinheads show single leaves impeccably rendered. Towards the middle of the painting, a small group of skinny-dippers in a pond. At the painting’s top, distant ships sail into a hazy harbor. In the depth of a vast white sky, a striking tiny, single-hair brushstroke of a solo bird sails through the air.
Ernest Hemingway was enamored with this painting. Lillian Ross wrote in a 1950s The New Yorker article, Hemingway wasn’t too enthusiastic about being in New York and disappointed on his visit to the Met when the Bruegel gallery was closed undergoing renovation. He said, “I sure miss the good Bruegel. It’s the great one, of the harvesters. It is a lot of people cutting grain, but he uses the grain geometrically, to make an emotion that is so strong for me that I can hardly take it.” Sounds like I may have fared better than Hemingway did on my visit.