The children's games

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Children's Games (Pieter Bruegel the Elder)
The children's games
Pieter Bruegel the Elder , around 1560
oil on wood
118 × 161 cm
Art History Museum

The Children's Games is a painting by the Flemish painter Pieter Bruegel the Elder from around 1560 . 91 different children's games from the Netherlands in the 16th century are shown. Today the work is in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna .

construction

The viewer looks down at a square from medium height. As is often the case with Bruegel, the main axis runs from bottom left to top right. The main vanishing point is a church near the top right corner. A second “half” line of flight also begins at the dark building, continues along the red fence and ends at the entrance of the massive building in the upper half of the picture. Despite the right-leaning, the painting appears balanced due to the massive buildings in the left half. The picture does not offer an “ideal point of view”. In order to maintain an overview, a viewer has to move away from the picture. But the details can only be seen at close range. As for the main vanishing point, a viewer would have to stand in front of the right half of the painting.

content

Woman with a bucket (detail from the upper right half of the picture)

The children wear the typical clothing of the 16th century and with their round heads and button eyes are not represented very individually. You can see 168 boys and 78 girls and, depending on the interpretation, one or two adults: a woman in the bridal procession in the center of the picture and an old woman in the upper right half of the picture who pours water over two brawlers. Although Bruegel documents the games of his time meticulously, the picture is far from realistic: all players or groups of players are isolated from one another. There are also no children excluded from the games, or idle bystanders or supervising adults, apart from the one or two people mentioned.

Play equipment are: spinning tops , hobby horses , dolls, windmills; repurposed objects such as barrels, barrel hoops, bones or pork bladders. Three different types of games are shown: functional games such as walking on stilts and hobby horse riding, rule games such as tug-of-war and the blind cow , role-playing games such as the bride's procession in the center of the picture and games of frenzy (turning in a circle).

interpretation

Until after Bruegel's time, children were seen as small adults and were also dressed like that, apart from the younger ones (girls up to about five, boys up to about eleven). In any case, nothing is known of an earlier such comprehensive account. Comparable are Bruegel's pictures The Dutch Proverbs and The Struggle Between Carnival and Lent (both 1559)

The blue mantle (detail from the baptismal procession)

The picture can be read as a folklore inventory. In fact, most games can be determined. Perhaps Bruegel wanted to warn against wasting life like a child's game: On the left side, for example, a boy is trying to shoot an owl, the symbol of wisdom. A participant in the baptismal procession in the lower left corner has a long blue cloak around his neck, which could be considered a lie and self-deception (“Iemand een blauwe huik omhangen”). However, these two perspectives are not mutually exclusive. There is some evidence that the artist depicts St. John 's Day (June 24th), which was considered the summery counterpart to Christmas. Towards the end of the long street, a children's procession is shown, as it was customary that day, for example to collect firewood for the evening bonfire. There was a superstition that this day would mean sacrificing "a deep swimmer and a high climber". Climbing and swimming were therefore considered dangerous and were forbidden. In the upper left half of the picture, however, children are doing just that.

Didactic reception

The Bruegel picture presents adults and children alike in its streetscape a paradise for children's games, as it only existed in reality in the immediate post-war period of destroyed Germany. Playground was everywhere in abundance.

Game didacticians used accordingly always the Bruegelbild as a worthwhile project, old cultural in the field of gambling to awaken to fresh life. From a didactic and pedagogical point of view, the idealistic painting by the Flemish peasant painter has found its way into other subjects, above all in school festivals and interdisciplinary projects :

There is literary evidence of how the numerous, often forgotten movement games with their game ideas and rules can be tracked down, tried out and further developed in an exciting journey of discovery with children in physical education . It is documented how the German lesson uses the opportunity to prepare suitable game descriptions within the scope of the task “description of the process” provided in the curriculum and then to have the clarity of the wording checked in practice. As part of the joint project, the art class brings the children closer to the historical characteristics of the games and motivates them to creatively make collages . According to the literature, the project form is the most frequently used method to provide children with age-appropriate, versatile access to the Bruegel image based on the principle of multidimensional learning .

history

It is not known whether Bruegel himself gave the painting a name. It was first mentioned around 1600 as a different piece, van allerley spelen der Kinderen , from which the name Die Kinderspiele goes back. Today it is in the Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien in Hall X together with Bruegel's works Great Tower of Babel , Fight between Carnival and Lent , The Hunters in the Snow , Christ Carrying the Cross , Farmer and Bird Thief , Farmer's Dance , The Farmer's Wedding , The Return of the Flock , The gloomy day , the conversion of Paul and Saul's suicide .

literature

  • Alfred Cammann (ed.): The world of Low German children's games , Meissner, Elbschloss Bleckede 1970 DNB 367402548 .
  • Jeannette Hills: The children's play picture by Pieter Bruegel the Elder. Ä. (1560): A folklore study (publications by the Austrian Museum for Folklore), 2nd edition, Vienna 1997, ISBN 978-3-900359-76-8 .
  • Udo Lange, Thomas Stadelmann:: Playground is everywhere, planning and designing lively worlds of experience with children , Herder, Freiburg im Breisgau 1995, ISBN 3-451-23757-1 .
  • Hella Langosch, Annika Langosch (photos): Old children's games - rediscovered, games for inside and outside; Ball and running games; Paper and puzzle games , revised and refurbished edition. Rowohlt, Reinbek bei Hamburg 2003, ISBN 3-499-61706-4 .
  • Paul Portmann: Pieter Bruegel the Elder Ä. The children's games , Stuttgart 1961
  • Erika Szegedi: Games of other times and peoples - further developed with children , Wiss. Thesis GHS, Karlsruhe 1999
  • Siegbert A. Warwitz , Anita Rudolf: The children's games by Pieter Brueghel , In: Dies .: Project teaching. Didactic principles and models . Schorndorf 1977, pages 74-88
  • Siegbert A. Warwitz (Ed.): Games of other times and peoples - discover and experience with children , Karlsruhe 1998
  • Siegbert A. Warwitz, Anita Rudolf: The children's games by Pieter Brueghel the Elder. Ä. In: Dies .: The sense of playing. Reflections and game ideas . 4th edition, Baltmannsweiler 2016, ISBN 978-3-8340-1664-5 , pp. 191-195.

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e Christiane Högg de Souse Monteiro / Michaela Krause: The children's game picture by Pieter Bruegel . ( Memento from July 19, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Group work for the advanced seminar “Pedagogical Topics in Art”.
  2. ^ Rose-Marie and Rainer Hagen - Pieter Bruegel the Elder Ä .: around 1525 - 1569; Farmers, fools and demons , Cologne: Benedikt Taschen Verlag 1999, p. 33, ISBN 3-8228-6590-7
  3. ↑ “Peasants, Fools and Demons”, p. 31f.
  4. ↑ Sartori: Article "John the Baptist" in the dictionary of German superstitions , Vol. 4, Col. 704–727, here Col. 725.
  5. ↑ U. Lange, Th. Stadelmann: Playground is everywhere , Freiburg 1995
  6. ↑ Anita Rudolf, Siegbert Warwitz: Playing - rediscovered. Basics-suggestions-help. Freiburg 1982
  7. ^ H. Langosch: Old children's games - newly discovered , Freiburg 1991
  8. ^ Siegbert A. Warwitz, Anita Rudolf: School festivals and projects. The children's games by Pieter Brueghel the Elder Ä. In: Dies .: The sense of playing. Reflections and game ideas . 4th edition, Baltmannsweiler 2016, ISBN 978-3-8340-1664-5 , pp. 191-195
  9. ^ Siegbert A. Warwitz (ed.): Games of other times and peoples - discover and experience with children , Karlsruhe 1998.
  10. ↑ Erika Szegedi: Games of other times and peoples - further developed with children , Wiss. Thesis GHS, Karlsruhe 1999
  11. ↑ A. Cammann (Ed.): The world of Low German children's games , Bleckede / Elbe 1970.
  12. ^ Siegbert Warwitz, Anita Rudolf: The children's games by Pieter Brueghel , In: Dies .: Project teaching. Didactic principles and models . Schorndorf 1977, pages 74-88.
  13. ↑ Kunsthistorisches Museum - interactive : visit - Gemäldegalerie DVD-Rom. 2nd edition 2007 (navigation) ISBN 978-3-902491-09-1

Web links

Commons : The children's games  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files