67. A 500-year-old commentary on our limited attention spans
A Dutch painter and a British-American poet both understood the human condition.
This post is my third experiment in presenting two pieces back to back, without the interpretation section. (here are the first and second!) I hope you enjoy puzzling out shared themes, or perhaps ways in which each one builds upon the other.
suggested reading method
To best savour this artwork, please take a moment to eliminate distractions. Consider minimizing all other windows on your computer; putting other devices (phone, tv etc) aside; taking a deep breath, to the full extent of your lung capacity; and focusing solely on the “artwork 1” and “artwork 2” sections.
Once you’ve processed those to your satisfaction, the rest of the post is optional reading, provided only for context about the artists.
artwork 1
Landscape With the Fall of Icarus by Pieter Bruegel the Elder. 1560. Oil paint on canvas.
artwork 2
Musée des Beaux Arts
About suffering they were never wrong,
The old Masters: how well they understood
Its human position: how it takes place
While someone else is eating or opening a window or just walking dully along;
How, when the aged are reverently, passionately waiting
For the miraculous birth, there always must be
Children who did not specially want it to happen, skating
On a pond at the edge of the wood:
They never forgot
That even the dreadful martyrdom must run its course
Anyhow in a corner, some untidy spot
Where the dogs go on with their doggy life and the torturer's horse
Scratches its innocent behind on a tree.In Breughel's Icarus, for instance: how everything turns away
Quite leisurely from the disaster; the ploughman may
Have heard the splash, the forsaken cry,
But for him it was not an important failure; the sun shone
As it had to on the white legs disappearing into the green
Water, and the expensive delicate ship that must have seen
Something amazing, a boy falling out of the sky,
Had somewhere to get to and sailed calmly on.
by W. H. Auden, written in 1938.
context
Pieter Brueghel the Elder (~1525 - 1569) was a Dutch painter and printmaker. While he painted some religious works, he specialized in large paintings combining landscapes with peasant subjects.
W.H. Auden (1907 - 1973) was a British-American poet, playwright, and critic who grew up in Birmingham. He published his first book, Poems, in 1930 with the help of T.S. Eliot. After moving to the US in 1939, he won the Pulitzer Prize in 1948 for his long poem The Age of Anxiety. Auden is considered an “anti-Romantic” poet.
For a cogent analysis of these pieces as a pair, and in relation to Auden’s other work, check out this NY Times interactive article.
What similarities and differences did you notice, especially in how these artists portrayed the human response to suffering? Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments!