The conversion of Paul

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The Conversion of Paul (Pieter Bruegel the Elder)
The conversion of Paul
Pieter Bruegel the Elder , 1567
Oil on oak
108 × 156 cm
Art History Museum

The Conversion of Paul is an oil painting created in 1567 by the Flemish painter Pieter Bruegel the Elder . The 108 x 156 cm work shows a scene from the Acts of the Apostles and is now in the Kunsthistorisches Museum Vienna in room 10.

The paintings

content

The setting is a bizarre mountain landscape with a view of a distant plain with a sea coast. A large army of armed soldiers and noble horsemen rises, but the path becomes more and more impassable and is already covered by low-lying clouds further behind. Right in the center of the picture, but not particularly emphasized, is a fallen rider who looks to the top left, where a ray of light breaks through the clouds, which apart from him only one figure seems to be perceiving, holding the reins of his shy horse.

signature

The signature

The signature is in the lower right corner on a boulder: BRVEGEL MDLXVII (BRUEGEL 1567).

interpretation

Mountain landscapes appear frequently in Bruegel's work. He had also used the return trip from his stay in Italy in the summer of 1552 to travel to the Alps , presumably through southern Switzerland . His first biographer Karel van Mander comments that when Bruegel was in the Alps, he swallowed all the mountains and rocks and spat them out again as painting boards .

Detail with fallen Saul and black rider

Bruegel varies a theme from the biblical Acts of the Apostles: the Damascus experience of Saul, the persecutor of Christians ( Acts 9 : 1–19  EU ) (see below). It corresponds to the custom of Bruegel to place the eponymous event in the middle, but not to emphasize otherwise. On the way to Damascus , where he wanted to take Christians prisoner, Saul is blinded by a bright light, falls to the ground, hears the voice of Christ and is struck with blindness. In contrast to the biblical account, the setting near Bruegel is a high mountain, but from the top left you can see the heavenly light that blinds Saul. In this way, the artist turns an inner experience of conversion into an outer one: the path over the mountains is blocked for the persecutor and forces him to turn back.

The Bethlehemite Child Murder (Hampton Court, c.1566)

A black rider seen from the back in the right half of the picture is placed so that he must see the fallen victim. The picture is dated 1567, one year after the Calvinist iconoclasm . At that time, the new governor, Duke Alba , appointed by Philip II , moved from Italy with mercenaries across the Alps to the Spanish Netherlands to put down the uprising. According to a widespread interpretation, the artist expresses the hope that the “black” Alba, known as cruel, might convert, that is, “become Paul from Saul”. The Bethlehemite Child Murder from around 1566, in which Bruegel relocates the biblical events to a Flemish village, comes from the same topic . The picture probably shows a punitive expedition under Margaret of Parma , even if the leader of the mounted lancers is often identified as Alba. The original London picture ( Hampton Court ) has been heavily painted over, the signature is also half cut away and the date is completely missing. A copy of Pieter Brueghel the Younger , which should come as close as possible to the original state, hangs in the Kunsthistorisches Museum Vienna.

Place of issue

The conversion of Paul is located as Conversion Pauli in the Kunsthistorisches Museum Vienna, room 10 together with: Bethlehemitic child murder , (Pieter Bruegel the Younger) fight between carnival and fasting , the peasant wedding , the return of the flock , the carrying of the cross , the children's games , the gloomy day , the hunters in the snow and great tower of Babel .

background

Historical context

Philip II , the son of Emperor Charles V , had moved his seat from Brussels to Castile in the summer of 1559 after the war against France had been won, which in the Netherlands was perceived as a degradation. After all, he appointed his half-sister Margarethe von Parma , a native of Flemin, to be general governor of the seventeen provinces. The individual provinces, which had a relatively high degree of independence, received their own local aristocratic leaders as governors.

Soon, however, flared controversy over the reorganization of the dioceses and the coming still from the reign of Charles V heretic laws against Protestants . Favored by the aristocratic leaders for strategic reasons, radical Calvinism spread , whose followers demanded a state of God . At its peak, there was a six-day iconoclasm in August 1566, during which more than four hundred churches were devastated. In response, Philip II deposed his half-sister and appointed Álvarez de Toledo (Duke Alba) as the new governor. Initially, the latter was able to successfully suppress the uprising, but (among other things) the introduction of high taxes re-fueled the uproar, which eventually led to the division of the country into a Catholic south ( Belgium ) and a Protestant north (today's Netherlands).

Paul's "Damascus Experience" (Acts of the Apostles)

Ananias and Paul. Ceiling fresco in St. Peter near Laion by Josef Arnold

The Jewish fundamentalist Saul wanted to arrest the Christians in Damascus with the authority of the high priest and bring them to Jerusalem . Before he got there, however, a light suddenly shone from the sky. He fell to the ground and heard a voice: "Saul, Saul, why are you following me?" The companions stood confused because they could hear the voice but see no one. The apparition revealed himself to be Jesus Christ and ordered him to go into the city and wait. When Saul opened his eyes, he was blind and remained so for three days. At the same time the Lord told a disciple named Ananias to go to the house of Judas on Straight Street and ask about Saul from Tarsus . He would have had a vision that a man named Ananias would make him see again by the laying on of hands . When this was done, Saul was converted, baptized and preached Christianity in the synagogues in Damascus ( Acts 9  ESV ).

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Kunsthistorisches Museum - interactive: visit Gemäldegalerie 2007 (DVD-Rom) audio commentary on The Conversion of Paul . ISBN 978-3-902491-09-1
  2. ↑ Pieter Bruegel the Elder Ä. in the Kunsthistorisches Museum Vienna. Ed. Wilfried Seipel. Skira editore, Miliano 1997, 2008 ISBN 978-3-85497-133-7 Image: back cover, comment p. 114
  3. ^ Rose-Marie and Rainer Hagen - Pieter Bruegel the Elder Ä. around 1525–1569 - farmers, fools and demons , Cologne: Benedikt Taschen Verlag GmbH 1999 Chapter: A short life in dangerous times pp. 7 to 14 ISBN 3-8228-6590-7
  4. ^ Christian Gräf: The winter pictures of Pieter Bruegel the Elder. Ä. VDM Verlag Dr. Müller, Saarbrücken 2009, chapter: Bethlehemitischer Kindermord (around 1566) - Secularized religious subject, political criticism p. 87 ff. ISBN 978-3-639-12775-1
  5. ↑ Kunsthistorisches Museum - interactive: visit Commentary on: The child murder in Bethlehem (Bethlehemite child murder)
  6. ↑ interactive: visit Gemäldegalerie 2007 (DVD-Rom) Navigation
  7. ↑ Brockhaus multimedial premium 2007 article Netherlands in the struggle for freedom: For gold and freedom