# Introduction

The Census of Bethlehem by Pieter Brueghel the Younger, painted around 1610-1620 and exhibited at the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Lille, is a copy of a work by the painter's father, Peter Brueghel the Elder, painted in 1566. Bruegel the Elder's painting was commissioned by Jan Vleminck Sebastiaensz, lord of Wijnegem and a close associate of the Habsburgs. It was certainly intended as an interior decoration for private secular devotion.

If the title prepares us to contemplate a biblical episode, the painting places us in front of a snowy Flemish landscape contemporary with the painting's date of completion, as indicated by this village of houses with gabled roofs and cob walls typical of 17th-century regional architecture. Through the men in pants and chasubles, the women in aprons and bonnets, the carts and the barge on the river, the painting offers us a window on life in bygone times, when the United Provinces were under Spanish domination.

In Renaissance paintings, the religious scene traditionally occupied the foreground, while the scenery was secondary. Here, Brueghel reverses the hierarchy, blending the religious scene into this broad winter landscape.

Cartel: Pieter Brueghel the Younger, The Census of Bethlehem, circa 1610-1620, oil on canvas, 112.5 x 164 cm, Lille, Palais des Beaux-Arts

3D captation and text by : Chloé COMBALUZIER, Axelle HANQUER, Lisa MUCHEMBLED et Cléo VOUTCHKOVITCH.