About this artwork
This engraving hauntingly illustrates the proverb that the big fish always eats the little fish. Starting with the larger-than-life fish at its center, the image teems with grotesque activity, as bodies spill out of other bodies and hybrid creatures walk and fly about. Pieter Bruegel seems to take a dim view of humanity here, one of disgust at its seemingly endless capacity to cannibalize itself. This is epitomized in the hybrid fish-person at left carrying off its prize, another fish, in its gaping mouth. In the foreground, a man directs a child’s gaze toward the scene, telling him to “behold” (ecce) the proverbial truth on display.
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Status
- Currently Off View
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Department
- Prints and Drawings
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Artist
- Pieter van der Heyden
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Title
- Big Fish Eat Little Fish
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Place
- Flanders (Artist's nationality:)
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Date
- 1557
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Medium
- Etching and engraving in black on ivory laid paper, laid down on ivory laid paper
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Inscriptions
- Inscribed verso, upper center, in graphite: “Les grands poissons mangent ces petits / - D’apres un dessin de P. Brueghel reprouisant un composition de H. Bosch (Bastelaer) / - D’apres H. Bosch (M. Gossart) / # etat”; lower right, in pen and black ink: “B. 14.”; lower right, in graphite: “-7-”
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Dimensions
- Image: 21.7 × 29.9 cm (8 9/16 × 11 13/16 in.); Plate: 23 × 30 cm (9 1/16 × 11 13/16 in.); Sheet: 22.9 × 30.1 cm (9 1/16 × 11 7/8 in.)
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Credit Line
- The Amanda S. Johnson and Marion J. Livingston Fund
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Reference Number
- 2016.376
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IIIF Manifest
- https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/233437/manifest.json
Extended information about this artwork
Object information is a work in progress and may be updated as new research findings emerge. To help improve this record, please email . Information about image downloads and licensing is available here.
