Lot 118. Marten van Cleve the Elder (1527 Antwerp – 1581), Handing Over The Gifts For The Farmer's Festival. Oil on canvas. Relined. 104x170 cm. Sold for: €181,000 (Estimate € 130.000 - 150.000). © HAMPEL Fine Art Auctions Munich

In a generous format, a multi-figured depiction of a village square with numerous people whose narrative power is still strongly reminiscent of Pieter Brueghel the Elder. remember. It takes up the theme of the great peasant weddings: an ornamentally decorated cloth of honor is stretched in the middle distance in front of the connected group of houses. The bride and groom with a red headband as a crown, marked as such, are sitting at a wide table in front of him. Wedding gifts in the form of cloth or money are presented at this table. The guests participate in the gifts according to their wealth, with the less wealthy also looking for possible dispensable items in their money box. The depiction is reminiscent of Pieter Brueghel the Elder both in terms of polychromy and the use of form. as well as based on Pieter Brueghel the Younger, but especially in the faces you can see a modified handwriting, which according to Dr. Ertz corresponds to that of Marten van Cleve, as can be seen in a table kept by the RKD, The Hague under number 190862. 

Accompanied by an expert's report by Dr Klaus Ertz, Lingen.