The Private Life of a Masterpiece

Pieter Bruegel the Elder: Census At Bethlehem (8x2)

Uitzenddatum: Dec 25, 2006

Arguably the painting that invented the snowy Christmas card scene, the Census at Bethlehem is a picture that depicts the arrival of Mary and Joseph at Bethlehem But it also a portrays Netherlands village under the grip of a cruel winter and under the hammer of a foreign army. The picture teems with human life as the best Breughels do, but it also speaks to the 21st century in an extraordinary way.