Irony and laughter had a special place
in 16th century Flanders society, and Pieter
Bruegel as one of the greatest painters of
this era displays this quality of his society.
Bruegel was a painter between the times of
middle ages and the Renaissance. In 1604
he was portrayed as the greatest comic artist
of his time however, the nature of his art is
something beyond the laughing subject and
for reaching a deeper understanding and
obtaining new meanings out of his works they
must be studied in terms of cultural context –
the carnival culture in 16th century Flanders
– which they were made in. In this essay
Mikhail Bakhtin’s points of view are used as a
proper theoretical structure for surveying the
works of Bruegel.
Bakhtin’s theories cover various and
widespread contexts and they have great
richness. The focus of this essay is on Bakhtin’s
notion and his special point of view toward
the carnival and grotesque realism. Bakhtin’s
carnival is the emanation of carnival spirit
in cultural productions such as painting and
literature. The main idea of Bakhtin’s work
in carnival comedy and grotesque realism is
to depict human body that relates to power
disposal and rebirth in carnival.
As Bakhtin says, carnivalesque is the
primary result of native, local or public
culture which people intend to and help by
its formation. Accordingly, by surveying
carnival forms and symbols, meaningful
correspondence can be made between works
of art like Bruegel’s and carnival literature of
Bakhtin. As a result, research method used in
this essay is an adaptive one and the analysis
is done by using written the documents and
sources.
Arabzadeh J, Mousavi Aghdam K, Eftekhari Yekta S. Study of Bruegel’s Painting Based on Bakhtin’s thoughts. کیمیای هنر 2015; 4 (14) :31-52 URL: http://kimiahonar.ir/article-1-333-en.html