刈り入れ人のいる夏の風景

Two hands made this. The sweeping landscape, the rolling gold fields falling away to a far blue sea, is the work of Joos de Momper, an Antwerp specialist in exactly this kind of vast panorama. The small figures scattered across it, the peasants cutting grain, resting at a picnic, flirting in the shade, were added by Jan Brueghel the Elder, son of the more famous Pieter. The two collaborated often, one painting the world and the other filling it with people. The composition looks back to a harvest scene by Jan's father from decades earlier. It was likely one of a set showing the labours of the seasons, and summer here is measured in the bent backs of people working through the hottest month.