Pieter Bruegel the Elder

Pieter Bruegel the Elder (c. 1525–1569) was a leading Flemish painter and printmaker of the Northern Renaissance, celebrated for landscapes and peasant scenes. Born near Breda, he became an Antwerp guild master in 1551 and travelled to Italy, reaching Rome. Settling in Antwerp in 1555, he designed prints for the publisher Hieronymus Cock before turning to painting.

In 1563 he married Mayken Coecke and moved to Brussels, where he died in 1569, leaving two painter sons, Pieter and Jan. His Landscape with the Fall of Icarus (c. 1560) and The Hunters in the Snow (1565) remain among his celebrated works.