By Namloh T

The beautiful and historical Greek island of Crete, bound by the azure Mediterranean Sea is the setting for one of Pieter Brueghel the Elder’s great paintings, ‘Landscape with the fall of Icarus’.

Hailing from the Netherlands, Pieter Brueghel the Elder was a Renaissance painter of note who inspired the likes of Peter Reubens as well as the work of many Flemish artists in the seventeenth century.

His 1558 masterpiece, ‘Landscape with the fall of Icarus’ provides a contemporary pastoral setting to the Greek mythological tale of Icarus who flew too close to the sun.

This work on canvas, depicts a panoply of European bucolic tranquillity.

A shepherd accompanied by his faithful hound tends to his flock as he looks up to the sky. White-sail galleons glide by as a farmer insouciantly tills his land with a harnessed horse in the foreground.

Brueghel’s use of Naples yellow suffices for the sun and it blends splendidly. with the edge of the sea, giving a cyan patina.  Forming a crescent around a burgeoning metropolis are undulating white mountains that stand as sentinels that almost meet low hanging clouds.

This painting makes me feel like I should be in a vineyard picking my own grapes, engaging in the fermentation process while watching the sunset.

Brueghel’s work here is beautiful to behold and encapsulates the story of Icarus. Here he can be seen drowning, legs akimbo, his torso engulfed by the Mediterranean Sea with no one coming to his aid.

According to Greek mythology, Icarus’s father Daedalus created the Labyrinth which was used by King Minos of Crete to imprison both father and son.

A resourceful Daedalus makes artificial wings for them both glueing them together with wax in order to fly their way into freedom.

Daedalus cautions Icarus not to fly too close to the sun as the wax would likely melt and he would plummet into the sea. He did not heed his father’s advice and, of course, the consequences of his foolhardiness are clear for all to see.

I find this painting interesting due to its title “Landscape with the fall of Icarus”. All I can see of Icarus are his ‘likkle foot dem sprawl out inna the sea!’

It’s a classic story.

‘Landscape with the fall of Icarus’ has resided for centuries in the Royal Museums of Fine Arts in Brussels, which is fitting in a way as Brueghel spent the last few years of his life in the Belgium capital.

However, it was deemed a copy with the original lost some time ago.

The moral here is one of caution – yes, live a little, enjoy life but in doing so try not to be reckless or self-destructive.