Tête de paysan

Bruegel made this small panel late in his short life, around 1568, in Brabant, in what is now Belgium, under Spanish rule. It is barely larger than a sheet of paper, and it shows the head of an old peasant woman in a plain white linen cap. There is no flattery in it. Her skin is worn, her mouth set, her eyes turned aside, and Bruegel records all of it plainly, the way he painted country people throughout his work. For a long time the panel carried no visible signature. Then in 2018 conservators uncovered the letters Pb in a top corner, the start of the Latin form of his name, confirming his hand. She is looking at something outside the frame that we are never shown.