The battle between the religious and the secular has been a widely used theme in art for centuries. With the birth of the Renaissance and a turning away from the Catholic dominated life, art began to express the reality behind the central problem of human existence; the struggle between being a pious Christian and being an individual. Pieter Bruegel the Elder is an artist who was fascinated by this eternal struggle. Considered the greatest Flemish painter of the age, Bruegel created many controversial paintings that portrayed his beliefs towards the religious conflicts of his age. None of his paintings reveals his beliefs more clearly than "The Battle between Carnival and Lent." A painting filled with symbolism, "The Battle" expressed Bruegel's attitude towards the Catholic-Lutheran conflicts that were occurring in his time. Although Bruegel painted "The Battle between Carnival and Lent" in 1559, in the latter period of the Northern Renaissance, the painting does not wholly embody aspects of Renaissance work. With the painting's strong religious theme and grotesque, unrealistic human figures, "The Battle" presents an element of medieval art. The painting is representative of its era by the way in which Bruegel uses color, shadowing and dimension. .
Pieter Bruegel was one of the most gifted yet mysterious painters of the Northern Renaissance, for very little is known about his life. Born around 1530 in the village of Breda in the Netherlands, Bruegel spent his life working in Antwerp and Brussels. Originally born Pieter Brueghel, he changed his name in 1559 for an unknown reason. Bruegel studied under many of Northern Europe's finest painters, from Pieter Coeck van Aelst, a leading Antwerp artist, to Hieronymous Bosch. Bruegel was greatly influenced by Bosch's pessimism and satirical approach to art . While working under Bosch Bruegel contributed to many of Bosch's signature scenes of drollery and earned himself the nickname of "The Droll.