Pieter Balten - Peasant Kermis with a Performance of the Farce 'Een Cluijte van Plaijerwater' (1570)
“Details about the life of Pieter Baltens are scarce. Baltens was born in Antwerp c. 1527 as the son of the sculptor Baltens Custodis (or Baltens Janszoon de Costere). He was registered as a member of the local Guild of Saint Luke in 1540 under the name 'Pierken Custodis'. He was admitted as a master of the Guild in 1550.
The early 17th-century Flemish art historian Karel van Mander is the key source on the life of Baltens. Van Mander stated in his 1604 Schilder-boeck that Baltens became a member of the Guild of St. Luke in 1579. It is now known from other sources that van Mander had this date wrong. Van Mander's error is possibly due to a misreading of the date 1569, the date on which Baltens became a member of the governing board of the Guild. Another erroneous statement by van Mander, which had a devastating impact on Baltens' art historical reputation, was to call Baltens a follower of Pieter Bruegel the Elder. Van Mander was in fact wrong on the date on which Baltens joined the local Guild as well as on Baltens' relationship with Pieter Bruegel the Elder which he qualified as that of a follower.
In 1550-1551 Bruegel in fact worked as an assistant of Peeter Baltens and eventually painted his own version of Balten's Tower of Babel. The two artists are known to have collaborated on an altarpiece (now lost) for the Glovemakers' Guild in Mechelen. In this commission it was Baltens who painted the central part of the altarpiece and Bruegel the wings in grisaille. This division of tasks suggests that Baltens was the more established figure in the collaboration. (…)
His work was mainly dedicated to a genre that became very popular during his lifetime: the depiction of the traditions of peasant life. He was one of the first artists to create realistic renderings of village feasts and celebrations with crowds of revellers. While art historians used to regard Baltens as a follower of Pieter Bruegel in the peasant genre, it is now believed to be more likely for Baltens to have influenced Bruegel rather than the other way around or that the artists drew inspiration from each other's works. (…) Baltens' work was also influential on the next generation of the Bruegel dynasty as Pieter Bruegel the Elder's son and imitator Pieter Bruegel the Younger copied a detail of Baltens' Ecce homo and turned it into an independent work. Landscape with two pilgrims walking along a road.
His highly coloured and energetically painted figures emphasize the farcical aspects of village life. His interest in the comical side of village life is evident in The performance of the farce of the phony water (c. 1550, Rijksmuseum). The composition depicts a village scene with the performance of the popular farce Een cluyte van Plaeyerwater ('A farce of phony water'). The farce tells the story of a wife who sends her husband to find phony water to cure her. In fact the wife plots to have a tryst with her lover, a priest. The wife's plot is foiled when the husband is informed about his wife's intentions and catches her.
Peeter Baltens' style is characterised by clearly and energetically defined forms. His palette, showing a preference for bright red, which made the figures stand out from the background, was audacious in its time. These bright colors emphasized the exuberant gaiety of the villagers' merrymaking.” - Wikipedia
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