Tag Archives: Brueghel

Can Anyone Come Out and Play?

It took me a minute to get the point of this recent New Yorker cover:

…eventually, I figured it out: the cat is immersed in chasing the animated mice in the video game on the tablet.  In the background, real mice are having a party.  “When the cat’s away, the mice will play.”  The cat’s body is not “away” – it’s in the same physical space as the mice — but its attention is not there; it’s captivated by the screen.

                  Everywhere we turn, people’s attention is on their screens instead of their immediate surroundings.  Brilliantly designed digital clickbait has become our culture’s catnip. 

                  My thoughts turn to one of my favorite paintings, “Children’s Games” (Brueghel, 1560):

                  As I noted in a post three years ago,[i] there are 80 different games portrayed here: playing with dolls, shooting water guns, wearing masks, climbing a fence, doing a handstand, Blind Man’s Bluff, making soap bubbles, walking on stilts, riding a hobby horse made from a stick, playing with balloons (before latex, made from a pig’s bladder), catching insects, climbing a tree, and 68 others.  This was almost 500 years ago — before electricity, the microchip, Big Tech, and AI.  Kids left alone and unplugged find things and create. 

                  A current bestseller is The Anxious Generation by Jonathan Haidt. Haidt shows how the advent of the digital age has led to increasing isolation among teenagers, which in turn has contributed to a rise in depression and suicide.  He notes that many of the tech innovators in Silicon Valley restrict their own children’s screentime, then lead business ventures that will profit from making screens even more addictive.  Haidt encourages families and schools to restrict screentime and instead let kids be on their own more often to find out how real life works.  He founded “Let Grow,” an organization creating resources for families and schools to nurture kids’ character and self-reliance.

                  Two afternoons a week we care for our grandsons, ages 6 and 8.  They come to our house after school and have a snack.  We let them watch 20 minutes of a favorite show (currently a guide to building more complex “Minecraft” structures on their tablets).  Then we turn the television off and discuss what’s next: board games, crafts, gardening, or some sport.   

                  Recently my wife had to take the 8-year-old to an early baseball practice, so I had 45 minutes with the 6-year-old.  We went out into the backyard to hit whiffle balls.  We used to have ten plastic balls, but as the boys have gotten stronger, their hitting prowess has led to nine being lost over the fence and elsewhere.  We started playing with the last one, the old savvy veteran pitching tossing to the promising rookie.  Soon the ball disappeared over the neighbor’s fence. But I found a partially cracked plastic golf ball buried in the bushes.  I asked if he wanted to see if he could hit it. He liked the challenge and got some great whacks. In the process, the crack expanded.  We were sure one more solid hit would split it in two. But the time came for me to take him home. Last seen, the little broken ball had fled into the bushes to survive for another day.

                  We had just spent 20 minutes playing with a whiffle bat and a broken plastic golf ball.  What we did was not planned or packaged.  It was improvised.  It was fun.  It was physical and mental.  Our bodies, attention, and minds were all present in real time, interacting with each other and the surrounding environment.

                  Tech marches on.  I look forward to the good things that may come our way (maybe from future engineers who became masters at Minecraft).  But I worry every day about where AI is going to take our attention.  We think we are smart, but tech is getting smarter.  I am a constant advocate for putting limits on tech.  This week I signed up with “Let Grow” to follow what they are doing. I want to see more kids hitting balls with sticks.

(The bashed-up plastic golf ball may be hiding in this plant.)

[i] The previous post in which I featured Brueghel’s painting is at https://wordpress.com/post/drjsb.com/376

For a more detailed study of “Children’s Games,” go to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Children%27s_Games_(Bruegel)

Icarus and Us

         Imagine visiting a gallery and coming upon this painting for the first time without knowing its title.  What do you see?

         I see the farmer with the red shirt guiding the blade of his plow. 

         I see the ship sailing in the nearby channel. Having just taken some sailing classes, I’m curious about the design of the ship.  The sails on the bow and stern are capturing a strong wind; those on the central mast are not extended.  If they were unfurled, would the wind blow too strongly and make navigation difficult?  

         I notice the shepherd looking at the sky with his dog by his side and the sheep grazing.  Is he looking at a specific object, or just daydreaming?

         My attention moves to the background where I see the harbor and a few buildings.

         I’ve seen enough.  A visual “slice of life” from the mid-16th century.  Interesting. Sort of.

         But then I happen to see the brass plate next to the frame: “Landscape With the Fall of Icarus.” 

         What? Where’s Icarus?

         Taking a second look, I discover Icarus in the lower right-hand corner –a pair of legs entering the sea with feathers fluttering in his wake. 

         How did I miss him? 

         In the Greek myth, Daedalus learned how to make wings using feathers and beeswax.  His son Icarus is young and wants to fly.  His father warns him he must not go too close to the sun, or the wings will melt, and he’ll fall to earth. But Icarus is young and confident. He ascends. The wings melt. He falls to his death in the sea.

         Looking at the rest of the scene a second time, I realize no character seems to notice him.  Reading about the painting, I discover that’s the point. 

         People are in trouble around us every day.  A young man’s life ends and what are we doing? Farming? Sailing? Staring at the sky?  Fishing?

         The story of Icarus evokes something personal for me.

         In my early 20s, I’d had what Jung called an inflated ego. I had become isolated and was taking risks with my life. Like Icarus, I believed I was immune from any serious consequences. But then I had a personal crisis which put me in peril. I could have easily fallen into the sea, unnoticed by people around me until it was too late.  If not for the grace of God, I don’t know how I would have survived.

         Hidden tragedies and pain are no doubt being carried by people we pass every day –at Trader Joe’s, at Costco, at work, or walking in our neighborhood. Do we notice them?

         I was at the local movie theater recently to see “West Side Story.”  After the film ended, the small crowd was exiting while the theater was still dark. Just in front of me, an elderly gentleman with a cane fell to the floor. His wife had charged ahead and didn’t see it.  I knelt and asked if he was alright, and carefully helped him stand up. He regained his balance but seemed dazed.  His wife came back and, a bit impatiently, told him to follow her. 

         Don’t most of us want to notice others in need and help when we can?

         But can we spend our entire day on the lookout for strangers in trouble?

         Looking again at the painting, I notice new details.

         Take the farmer. He’s not working a flat prairie field in Kansas where he could let his attention go elsewhere.  He’s plowing a steep hill which requires extra focus.  He needs to do this well if he’s to care for his land and raise food for his family and village.

         How about the sailing ship? The ship is passing through a narrow channel.  The captain and crew need to be on alert for any changes in the strong wind, ready to respond in a skillful and timely manner if they are not going to run aground or collide with another ship.  They must bring their full attention to their work to be safe while make a living.

         And the shepherd. If that was my job and all seemed well in the moment, I might get lost in thought – I don’t think I’d be constantly scanning the horizon looking for someone in danger.

         This time I notice the fisherman in the red hat. He is the closest.  I don’t know why he doesn’t notice Icarus splashing in into the sea.

         A part of me identifies with those other characters, not just Icarus.  When we have responsibilities, we need to attend to them.  

         I say that to myself, but something tells me that may be a way to let myself off the hook from being alert to the suffering of others.

         The great spiritual traditions implore us to care for the stranger, to be our “brother’s keeper,” to be Good Samaritans in a world of self-absorption. I believe most of us do so when we can.  But can we do that all the time?

         This isn’t a pleasant pastoral scene. This is a soul-scan revealing the tension between our personal responsibilities and the call to care for others.

         Life is complicated.

         What a great work of art.

Landscape With the Fall of Icarus, Brueghel, c 1560

Dear Reader: On March 6, there was a stunning interactive piece in the New York Times exploring this painting and how it inspired a famous poem by W H Auden: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/03/06/books/auden-musee-des-beaux-arts.html. 

I had been meaning to write this modest reflection of my own before reading that article, and, after reading it, almost shelved my piece as it seems a bit simplistic. But I believe all great art invites many interpretations, even the humble ones.

Child’s Play

            This past Monday, I was driving past our neighborhood school at lunch time and saw something I had not seen in a year: children playing.  Outdoors. On the school property. Lots of them.  On their own. They were chasing balls and chasing each other. Some were sitting in pairs on the grass, some were walking around on their own, and some were involved with games on the blacktop. In the 27 years we have lived in our neighborhood, I’ve gone by the school almost every day, but it’s been a year since I’ve seen children playing at noon recess.

            Tears came to my eyes.

            The wonder of seeing children at play brought to my mind my experience in Vienna last January.  In the Kunsthistorisches Museum, I entered a room and saw “Children’s Games” by Pieter Bruegel the Elder, painted in 1560. It looked mildly interesting at first.  Then I read it depicts children playing 80 different games. I was transfixed.  461 years later, are any of these games familiar to you? 

  • Playing with dolls
  • Shooting water guns
  • Wearing masks
  • Climbing a fence
  • Doing a handstand or somersault
  • Blind Man’s Bluff
  • Making soap bubbles
  • Walking on stilts
  • Riding a hobby horse made from a stick
  • Rolling a hoop (now, thanks to Whamo, a hula hoop)
  • Balloons (before latex, made from a pig’s bladder)
  • Tiddlywinks or Mumblety-peg
  • Pulling hair
  • Playing marbles
  • Catching insects
  • Riding piggyback or on a broom
  • Putting on a play
  • Climbing a tree, swimming or diving
  • Running a gauntlet

And as Brueghel was committed to portraying life as it is lived, he also includes:

  • “Stirring excrement with a stick” (!) and “urinating.” 

(For a larger image, the other 54 activities and a visual guide to each one, go to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Children%27s_Games_(Bruegel))

            Some of the games in the painting are not as familiar, including imitating the religious rituals of the time.  And as we know, kids around the world are making new games every day. 

            I’m still struck by the joy and ingenuity of the children in the painting.  I remember similar delights I experienced in my youth, and the enthusiasm of the children I saw playing freely at their school on Monday after a year of Zooming and confinement.

            Video games have become a huge attraction in our time.  But leave kids on their own outdoors, and their imagination flourishes.

            I recall a church family weekend campout some years ago.  Kids who already were becoming hooked on digital entertainment were in nature for the weekend with unstructured time and only their imagination to draw on. I remember watching two of them spend 40 minutes with a half-full plastic water bottle. They were tossing it, kicking it, watching it tumble and laughing time after time…no screens or batteries required.

            In Proverbs 8 the poet is speaking of the presence of wisdom and creativity at the center of the natural world:

            The Lord created me at the beginning of his work,
                         the first of his acts of long ago….

            When he established the heavens, I was there,
                        when he drew a circle on the face of the deep,
                   when he made firm the skies above,
                        when he established the fountains of the deep,
                                     when he assigned to the sea its limit,
                         so that the waters might not transgress his command,
                        when he marked out the foundations of the earth,
                  then I was beside him, like a little child (or “master worker”) 
                        and I was daily God’s  delight,
                        rejoicing before him always,
                                    rejoicing in his inhabited world
                        and delighting in the human race. (Proverbs 8: 22, 27-31)

            As we gradually emerge from the COVID pandemic, I hope we will never take for granted the creativity at the center of life, visible in all its splendor when we see children at play.