Forge Village Around the Painted Bellows

A great leather bellows lies across the middle of the picture, its two wooden handles raised at the upper left and its brass nozzle pointing out at the lower right. The top board is painted with a sun, vines and flowers, and a glass dome on it shelters a small furnace where workers hold glowing orbs. Arched galleries, a carousel and a bell tower stand on the lid, and a cart is wheeled along the ledge beside the tower. Ladders climb the striped leather folds, and washing hangs from a line below. Around it, a village of crooked roofs, brick kilns, forges with open fires, stone bridges and staircases crowds every corner, with mushrooms and feathery leaves growing between the houses. Because the bellows, the kilns and the bridges each wear their own colours, the picture breaks apart into pieces that are easy to recognise.