Getty Museum
Gathering Twigs
Creator
Simon BeningFlemish Illuminator · 1483–1561
All works by this person →One of the most celebrated painters of Flanders in the 1500s, Simon Bening was hailed by Portuguese art critic Francisco da Hollanda as the greatest master of illumination in all of Europe. In addition to producing books for powerful aristocrats such as Cardinal Albrecht of Brandenburg, Bening worked for a group of international royal patrons including Emperor Charles V and Don Fernando, the Infan
More on Getty ULAN- Date
- about 1550
- Medium
- Tempera colors and gold paint
- Culture
- Flemish
- Department
- Manuscripts
- Institution
- Getty Museum
Two Flemish peasants gather sticks into bundles before a landscape of rolling hills, rural homes, and a river. The trees have lost their leaves, the sky is overcast, and the men are warmly dressed, suggesting winter. In addition, the activity of clearing away dead wood was traditionally a wintertime activity. This small cutting from the lower border of a manuscript page originally served as an illustration in the calendar section of a book of hours. The seasonal character of the landscape suggests that it was associated with one of the winter months. The expansive landscape and the description of atmosphere are characteristic of the art of Simon Bening, who worked in the first half of the 1500s, when landscape painting emerged as an independent genre of art in easel paintings.
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