Data Bases • Custom Term Papers • Free Term Papers • Free Research Papers • Free Essays • Free Book Reports • Plagiarism? Links • Top 100 Term Paper Sites • Top 25 Essay Sites • Top 50 Essay Sites • Search 97,000 Papers @ DirectEssays.com • Search 101,000 Papers @ ExampleEssays.com • Search 90,000 Papers @ MegaEssays.com Free Essays • Term Paper Sites • Chuck III's Free Essays • Free College Essays • TermPaperSites.com • My Term Papers • Get Free Essays • Essay World • Planet Papers	Search Lots of Essays Back to Subjects - Art The Harvesters The Harvesters The Harvesters—Pieter Bruegel the Elder Right from your first approach The Harvesters invites you in. It does so just from it large size, which greats you as if it were a huge picture window. The Grand view centralizes on the foreground, occupied with harvesters on their break. The painting then leads you down through a warm colored labyrinth of paths cut out of the sweeping wheat fields, which drop down and directs you into the vast mid-ground. The many small paths in the mid-ground swing through the green trees and up and around the hills, and finally bring your eyes to the background with its soft mountainous seascape. This is the basic composition but because of its tremendous view each section of the painting demands a closer look. The scene presented in the painting contains miles of land to view, but the artist chose the foreground as the area of main focus. Off to the right in the foreground, among the bundles wheat, sit a group of people. These are the harvesters relaxing on their break. One man lies against a tree as if rooting it to the ground; his body is sprawled out, limbs extended. I believe the artist portrayed the hard labor of cutting wheat as a cycle. All the way off to the right side of the foreground we are presented with two workers both of them are in the middle of the wheat cutting, their bodies lean into their work as they swing their sickles in the wheat field. Viewing in a clock-words motion we are led to a man emerging from a path in the field. He seems tired as he drags two water urns back to the group. Finally at three o clock as we come to the end of the cycle the viewer rests with the sleeping man who’s passed out against the tree. On the right side of the giant tree sits the group of people; all of them seem content as they sit on the ground or the bundles they cut and chomp on the fruit of their labor. As we move back into the painting we come across some triangular shapes, some of them being bundles of wheat while others are women bent over collecting wheat. Notice how the artist compares the two and shows the closeness these people have with their natural environment. A little further back you could just make out a man up in a tree, he stands among the tall branches as if he was a part of them and picks fruit. On the left of the tree the viewer is led through a path in the wheat field, which swoop down a mountainside and leads into the mid-ground. The middle ground is full of paths leading through a little village. At a closer look we find so much going on: we see children playing in field, people swimming in a pond and even the quaint, thatch roof cottages where they live. We are also made aware of the fait of the wheat as we see a horse drawn cart full to the brim with wheat. Though the mid-ground of the painting takes up less than a third of the painting, it contains so much and tells so much about these people’s lives. The paths continue on through more fields, up over mountainsides leading into the misty distance. Just over a few mountains we come to a small town on the bay. This painting has a great expansive feel, yet with the addition of the sea, the artist has in affect gave us access to all of the oceans. In the harbor sits a few large ships their masts faded by the atmospheric mist. Perhaps these ships are one more step for the wheat, bringing it Bibliography: Word Count: 630
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