Bruegel was perhaps the first of the Social Realist painters. He earned the nickname, ‘Peasant Bruegel’ because he chose to feature aspects of peasant life in an almost documentary style. He was said to spend much of his time living amongst peasants as research. Although he shared some interests with other Renaissance artists of the time, such as the human condition, he flew in the face of fashion and did not model his figure painting on the Classical style.
This work was part of a series depicting the months of the year that was probably inspired by the calendar pages from Gothic books of hours. One distinguishing aspect of this, and many of Bruegel’s landscapes, is the ‘wide-angle’ elevated view that seems to open up the scene and invite the viewer to step into it. In this composition the line of trees on the left give a visual rhythm that leads us into the scene and also emphasises the heavy trudge of the hunters as they return from what appears to be an unsuccessful hunt – it is January and game is no longer as easily tracked down. They pass a group of women preparing a fire outside the inn, presumably to roast the disappointing spoils of the hunt. Many of the figures have their backs to the viewer and although the people and the realities of their way of life are the subject of the work, they are not individually. They are everyman and everywoman. Though the scene is realistically ‘harsh’, there is also a majestic beauty to the vast whiteness of the land and the image has often been reproduced on Christmas cards.
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