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Peasant festivals – the circle dance
Circle dances have existed since the dawn of civilization; they belong to all ages and all nationalities. Artists, from the earliest times, have depicted the circle dances in sculpture, murals, illuminated manuscripts, and paintings. This post will focus on images of circle dances, as danced in villages, by Netherlandish artists of the 16th and early… Read more
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Peasant Festival – Bruegel’s Peasant Dance
Pieter Bruegel the Elder was by no means the first Netherlandish artist to paint peasants or peasant festivals, but he is unquestionably the most renowned. Bruegel’s earliest images of peasant festivals, like the slightly earlier Pieter van der Borcht, present the viewer a bird’s eye perspective of an entire village square where rustic folk are… Read more
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The Peasant: from Miniature to Monumental
Images of peasants, dancing or otherwise, gradually evolved from marginal figures decorating illuminated manuscripts to the monumental figures that highlight Pieter Bruegel the Elder’s The Peasant Dance. Early peasant images, most especially by the German artists Sebald Beham, Barthel Beham, and Erhard Schön, invariably presented the rustic as foolish, grotesque, uncouth, and hideous. Art patrons… Read more
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Lucas van Valckenborch – Dancers in a Landscape
An esteemed portraitist, painter of world landscapes and market scenes, man of the world and court painter, the Flemish artist Lucas van Valckenborch (c.1535 – 1597), depicted peasant dance and court dance in a number of his paintings. During his early training van Valckenborch studied in Mechelen, a centre specializing in world landscapes. He and… Read more
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Pieter Bruegel and Sons – a continuing story
Pieter Bruegel the Elder (c.1525/1530 – 1569), fondly referred to as Peasant Bruegel, had two sons; Pieter, born in 1564, and Jan, born in 1568. Both Pieter and Jan became celebrated artists. Pieter the Younger was an excellent artist and equally accomplished businessman; the greater bulk of his enormous oeuvre was centred around peasant themes.… Read more
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Bruegel/Brueghel – Dancers at a wedding
Pieter Bruegel the Elder’s original work, upon which The Peasant Wedding Dance is inspired, has been lost. Fortunately, Pieter van der Heyden engraved a work, presumed to be a copy of Bruegel’s painting, sometime after 1570. The setting of The Peasant Wedding Dance is, in part, comparable to The Wedding Dance (1566) where four dancing… Read more
14th century 15th century 16th century 17th century 18th century 19th century 20th century 21st century Adriaen Brouwer Adriaen Pietersz. van de Venne Adriaen van Ostade Albrecht Dürer Alma-Tadema art Arthurian Legends Bal des Ardents ballet Bergen School Bernard Picart Burgundian Court CoBrA Constant Cornelis Dusart Cornelis Massijs dance Dance/Dancers Dance around the Golden Calf dancers David Ryckaert III David Teniers the Younger David Vinckboons De Stijl Egg dance Else Berg Erhard Schön Flemish Art Frans Francken II Frans Huysmans George Hendrik Breitner Gertrud Leistikow Gillis Mostaert Hans Bol Hans Vredeman de Vries Harmen Meurs Henri Braakensiek Herman Bieling Hieronymus Bosch Hieronymus Francken the Younger illuminated manuscript Isaac Israels Isaac van Ostade Jacob Grimmer Jacob Savery I Jacobus van Looy Jan Brueghel the Elder Jan Mandijn & followers Jan Miense Molenaer Jan Sierhuis Jan Sluijters Jan Steen Jan Toorop Jean-Baptiste Vanmour Jean de Wavrin Jean Froissart Karel Appel Karel van Mander Kees Maks Kees van Dongen Leo Gestel Loyset Liédet Lucas van Valckenborch Maarten van Heemskerck Maastricht Hours Marius Bauer Marten van Cleve Mommie Schwarz Mondrian Paolo Fiammingo/Pauwels Franck Pieter Aertsen Pieter Balten/Peeter Baltens Pieter Bruegel the Elder Pieter Brueghel the Younger Pieter Codde Pieter de Bloot Pieter van der Borcht Pieter van der Heyden Piet Mondrian Piet van der Hem Romance of Alexander Roman de la Rose Rothschild Canticles Salome Sebald Beham Simon Bening Tango Theo van Doesburg Toer van Schayk Vilmos Huszár Vincent van Gogh Willem de Zwart
About me
As a young aspiring dancer I loved to ponder over the magnificent paintings created by Edgar Degas. How his ballerinas inspired me. The atmosphere of the Paris Opera, the beautiful tutus and the hard working dancers never failed to trigger my imagination. As the years past, I retained my love of dance, of Degas, of art, and developed an interest in knowing more about the cross fertilization between art and dance.
DANCE IMAGES IN THE ART OF THE NETHERLANDS 