Dutch and Flemish Renaissance painting represents the16th-century response toItalian Renaissance art in theLow Countries, as well as many continuities with the precedingEarly Netherlandish painting. The period spans from theAntwerp Mannerists andHieronymus Bosch at the start of the 16th century to the lateNorthern Mannerists such asHendrik Goltzius andJoachim Wtewael at the end. Artists drew on both the recent innovations of Italian painting and the local traditions of theEarly Netherlandish artists.

Antwerp was the most important artistic centre in the region. Many artists worked for European courts, including Bosch, whose fantastic painted images left a long legacy.Jan Mabuse,Maarten van Heemskerck andFrans Floris were all instrumental in adopting Italian models and incorporating them into their own artistic language.Pieter Brueghel the Elder, with Bosch the only artist from the period to remain widely familiar, may seem atypical, but in fact his many innovations drew on the fertile artistic scene in Antwerp.

Dutch and Flemish painters were also instrumental in establishing new subjects such aslandscape painting andgenre painting.Joachim Patinir, for example, played an important role in developinglandscape painting, inventing the compositional type of theworld landscape, which was perfected byPieter Bruegel the Elder who, followed byPieter Aertsen, also helped popularisegenre painting. From the mid-centuryPieter Aertsen, later followed by his nephewJoachim Beuckelaer, established a type of "monumentalstill life" featuring large spreads of food with genre figures, and in the background small religious of moral scenes. Like the world landscapes, these represented a typically "Mannerist inversion" of the normal decorum of thehierarchy of genres, giving the "lower" subject matter more space than the "higher".^[1]Anthonis Mor was the leading portraitist of the mid-century, in demand in courts all over Europe for his reliable portraits in a style that combined Netherlandish precision with the lessons ofTitian and other Italian painters.

Italian Renaissance influences begin to show onEarly Netherlandish painting around 1500, but in many ways the older style was remarkably persistent.Antwerp Mannerism is a term for painters showing some Italian influence, but mainly continuing the style and subjects of the older masters.Hieronymus Bosch is a highly individual artist, whose work is strange and full of seemingly irrational imagery, making it difficult to interpret.^[2] Most of all it seems surprisingly modern, introducing a world of dreams that seems more related toGothic art than the Italian Renaissance, although some Venetian prints of the same period show a comparable degree of fantasy. TheRomanists were the next phase of influence, adopting Italian styles in a far more thorough way.

After 1550 the Flemish and Dutch painters begin to show more interest in nature and beauty "in itself", leading to a style that incorporates Renaissance elements, but remains far from the elegant lightness of Italian Renaissance art,^[3]and directly leads to the themes of the great Flemish and DutchBaroque painters: landscapes, still lifes and genre painting (scenes from everyday life).^[2]

This evolution is seen in the works ofJoachim Patinir andPieter Aertsen, but the true genius among these painters wasPieter Brueghel the Elder, well known for his depictions of nature and everyday life, showing a preference for the natural condition of man, choosing to depict the peasant instead of the prince.

The Fall of Icarus (now in fact considered a copy of a Brueghel work), although highly atypical in many ways, combines several elements ofNorthern Renaissance painting. It hints at the renewed interest for antiquity (theIcarus legend), but the hero Icarus is hidden away in the background. The main actors in the painting are nature itself and, most prominently, the peasant, who does not even look up from his plough when Icarus falls. Brueghel shows man as an anti-hero, comical and sometimes grotesque.^[3]

• Renaissance in the Netherlands
• Northern Renaissance

• Snyder, James.Northern Renaissance Art, 1985, Harry N. Abrams,ISBN 0-13-623596-4.

• Orenstein, Nadine M., ed. (2001).Pieter Bruegel the Elder: Drawings and Prints.The Metropolitan Museum of Art.ISBN 978-0-87099-990-1.

• Media related toNorthern Renaissance paintings at Wikimedia Commons

• Renaissance in the Low Countries
• Renaissance art
• Dutch art
• Flemish art
• Netherlandish Renaissance art
• Northern Renaissance
• Netherlandish art

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