Painting is by Pieter Bruegel the Elder. (created around 1560)

"Landscape with the Fall of Icarus" touches upon the Greek myth of the tragedy of Icarus. As we know, according to Ovid and Appolodorus, Icarus, son of Daedalus, took flight from imprisonment wearing the fragile wings his father had fashioned for him. Heedless of his father's warning to keep a middle course over the sea and avoid closeness with the sun, the soaring boy exultantly flew too close to the burning sun, which melted his wings so that Icarus hurtled to the sea and death. The death of Icarus, the poet tells us "according to Brueghel," took place in spring when the year was emerging in all its pageantry.

The 'kind' of painting on which Bruegel concentrated was scenes from peasant life." He painted peasants merrymaking, feasting, and working, and so people have come to think of him as one of the Flemish peasants.

More Info: www.bouwman.com