About The Harvesters
Pieter Bruegel the Elder painted The Harvesters in 1565 as one of a series of paintings showing the times of the year, made for a wealthy merchant in Antwerp. Five of the series survive, and this is the only one outside Europe: it has been at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York since 1919.
The scene is high summer in the Flemish countryside. On the left, men scythe the tall golden wheat and women gather it into sheaves. In the foreground, under a pear tree, a group of peasants takes a midday break, eating bread, porridge and pears, while one man sleeps sprawled on his back. Beyond them the land opens up into a hazy panorama of fields, a village, a church, a pond with bathers and a distant harbor.
Bruegel was one of the first European painters to make ordinary working people and the landscape itself the subject of a large painting, rather than a backdrop to a religious or classical story.
Tips for this puzzle
The wheat field is one big area of similar gold, so leave it for later. Start with the pear tree and the group eating lunch, then work outwards along the paths and the edge of the field.
Pieter Bruegel the Elder, The Harvesters, 1565. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Public domain (CC0); image: www.metmuseum.org. Image source. All image credits
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