Provensen - Stadt

Art by Alice und Martin Provensen
- Puzzle Provensen -
Ravensburger | 49 pieces | 1964
Stylized illustration of a European town square with colorful buildings, carriages, and stone fortifications.

This stylized illustration depicts a historic town scene rendered in a charming, mid-century aesthetic. The upper half of the composition features a row of colorful, narrow-gabled European houses in hues of teal, brown, blue, pink, and yellow. Below these buildings, a bustling town square is populated by small, simplified human figures and a horse-drawn carriage. The entire scene is set against a textured, neutral-toned background that gives the artwork a vintage, painterly feel.

In the foreground, a sturdy, crenelated stone wall with rounded bastions spans the scene, suggesting a fortified settlement. The bottom section shows a lower path where two horses pull a blue covered wagon. Scattered, minimalist trees with spindly, dark branches frame the lower corners of the image, adding a sense of depth and seasonality.

The colour palette is a mix of muted earth tones—browns, beiges, and grays—contrasted with vibrant, solid blocks of saturated colour on the buildings and wagons. The art style is intentionally flat and geometric, characterized by clean lines and simple shapes. The overall mood is nostalgic and quaint, evoking a peaceful historical atmosphere through its balanced composition and deliberate, whimsical use of colour and form.

A stylized illustration of a historic European town square with colourful row houses and a stone fortress wall.

This illustration depicts a charming, stylized historic town scene, likely set in medieval Europe. The composition is split between a row of vibrant, multi-coloured merchant houses lining the back of a square and a sturdy stone fortress wall protecting the foreground. The architecture is simplified with clean lines and flat blocks of colour, giving it a whimsical, storybook quality.

The town square is bustling with small, silhouetted figures of people and horse-drawn carriages traversing the open space. The scene captures a quiet, active day, with a muted, textured golden-beige backdrop that suggests stone paving or a parchment-like sky. In the foreground, bare trees and sections of a stone fortification wall frame the view, grounding the composition.

The colour palette is a striking mix of earthy tones and bold, saturated hues. The houses feature distinct shades of blue, purple, pink, and yellow, which contrast against the warmer browns and tans of the defensive structures and the ground. The artistic style is reminiscent of mid-century graphic illustration, emphasizing geometric shapes and simplified forms over realistic shading. A fine texture overlaid across the image adds a sense of depth and aged paper charm to the overall presentation.

An illustration of a vintage car parked in a farmyard with a cow, chickens, and ducks.

This whimsical illustration depicts a vintage, open-top automobile parked within a rustic farm setting. The car, rendered in a muted teal-green with distinct, bright orange spoked wheels, sits prominently in the foreground. Its steering wheel and boxy frame suggest an early 20th-century design, adding a sense of nostalgic charm to the scene.

The backdrop features a farm building with pale, vertical wooden siding. A friendly brown cow peers out from behind a wooden fence, looking toward the vehicle with an inquisitive expression. Several poultry roam the area; a grey-speckled chicken stands near the front of the car, while a rooster with deep blue and orange plumage perches high up, overseeing the yard. Two ducks are positioned in the lower right, grounding the composition.

The artwork uses a soft, flat aesthetic typical of mid-century children's book illustrations, characterized by clean lines and a harmonious, muted colour palette. The scene is bathed in warm, light tones, evoking a peaceful day on a farm. The light is even and gentle, emphasizing the playful interaction between the mechanical vehicle and the curious barnyard animals. The overall mood is quaint, lighthearted, and serene.

Folk art illustration of a woman feeding chickens at a farmhouse in autumn.

This folk art style illustration depicts a serene farm scene during the autumn season. A white farmhouse with blue window shutters sits as the central focal point, accompanied by a smaller outbuilding behind it and a vibrant red barn to the right. In the foreground, a woman wearing a traditional dress, apron, and cap stands in the yard, scattering feed for a small flock of black chickens that gather at her feet. A white horse is partially visible on the right edge of the frame, near the barn.

The setting is enveloped in the warm, muted tones of fall. The trees are bare of leaves or sparsely covered in golden-brown foliage, stretching their dark, skeletal branches across the landscape. A white fence meanders through the background, suggesting a hilly or undulating terrain. The composition uses a flat, graphic approach typical of folk or primitive art, emphasizing clear shapes and simplified forms.

The colour palette is dominated by earthy neutrals, creamy whites, and soft golds, contrasted by the bold splash of the red barn and the dark, striking silhouettes of the chickens and the tree trunks. The light is diffused and soft, evoking a quiet, peaceful atmosphere characteristic of a rural harvest season. The artwork has a tactile, painterly quality with smooth, deliberate brushstrokes that define the architecture and the pastoral figures.

Stylized illustration of a colorful historic town square with fortified walls, horse-drawn carriages, and pedestrians.

This stylized illustration depicts a quaint town square framed by a sturdy, multi-towered stone wall in the foreground. Behind the wall, a vibrant row of tall, narrow buildings with peaked roofs stands in a palette of slate blue, muted gold, teal, violet, soft pink, and bright yellow. Each structure features simplified geometric windows and doors, creating a playful, storybook aesthetic.

In the central plaza, several tiny, abstracted figures in coats and dresses wander between a horse-drawn carriage and the surrounding architecture. The composition is layered with depth, moving from a foreground of sparse, bare trees and a secondary horse-drawn cart near a lower wall, to the bustling mid-ground activity, and finally the towering façades of the town. The overall perspective is slightly flattened, emphasizing the whimsical, graphic nature of the scene.

The artwork uses a textured, matte appearance reminiscent of printmaking or gouache paint. The color scheme is earthy and muted, dominated by shades of tan, brown, and grey, which makes the bright pastels of the buildings pop against the background. Small, decorative details like the dark silhouettes of people and the simple outlines of the carriages add charm to the scene, capturing a nostalgic, peaceful mood of a bygone era.

Vintage teal car parked in a barn with farm animals

A whimsical, mid-century modern style illustration depicts a vintage, open-topped teal car parked inside a wooden barn. The car features bright orange wheels, a blue interior, and prominent, pale yellow headlamps. It sits centrally in the frame, serving as the focal point among a lively collection of farm animals.

Various creatures interact with the vehicle and their surroundings. A brown cow peeks over a white wooden fence to the right, observing the scene with a curious expression. Several chickens are perched on top of the car's roof and the nearby fence, while a speckled hen walks on the barn floor near the front tire. To the right, a duck and two dark-colored geese complete the busy farmyard gathering.

The artwork utilizes a flat, graphic style with clean lines and muted, nostalgic colors—shades of teal, warm orange, white, and soft browns. The setting is bright and airy, suggesting a clean, well-lit barn interior. The composition feels playful and lighthearted, capturing a charming, idealized vision of rural life where machinery and nature coexist in harmonious, stylized simplicity.

A folk-art style painting of a farmhouse, a woman in traditional clothing feeding chickens, and a white horse.

This stylized, folk-art illustration depicts a peaceful rural farm scene. In the foreground, a woman wearing a blue dress, white apron, and bonnet stands in a yard, scattering feed to a group of black chickens. A white horse stands nearby on the right, watching the activity. The scene is anchored by several simple, white-walled farm buildings with dark roofs, arranged in a clustered layout against a backdrop of rolling hills.

The landscape is composed of flat, simplified shapes and textures, suggesting an autumnal or late-winter setting. The hills are filled with thin, bare-branched trees rendered in stark white or dark tones, contrasting against the golden-tan fields. A split-rail fence traverses the background, adding depth to the composition. The lighting is soft and even, highlighting the geometric simplicity of the farmhouse architecture and the quiet, domestic mood of the farmstead.

Notable details include a neat stack of logs near a stone chimney, blue-shuttered windows on one of the smaller buildings, and a small wooden feeding trough tucked against a wall. The artwork uses a folk-inspired palette of earthy browns, ochres, and muted blues, punctuated by the bold, high-contrast white of the buildings and trees. The overall style is reminiscent of mid-century graphic design, emphasizing clean lines and a whimsical, pastoral aesthetic.

Stylized illustration of a European town square with colorful buildings, carriages, and stone fortifications.
A stylized illustration of a historic European town square with colourful row houses and a stone fortress wall.
An illustration of a vintage car parked in a farmyard with a cow, chickens, and ducks.
Folk art illustration of a woman feeding chickens at a farmhouse in autumn.
Stylized illustration of a colorful historic town square with fortified walls, horse-drawn carriages, and pedestrians.
Vintage teal car parked in a barn with farm animals
A folk-art style painting of a farmhouse, a woman in traditional clothing feeding chickens, and a white horse.
🐼 Animal 🏠 Country 💬 Drawing 🌳 Landscape 👶 People 🎪 Place
Square | | Ribbon/Grid cut | Cardboard
Multipuzzles
#Barn #City
Manufacturer ID: 15.251
❤️0   ✅2   📝1   ⭐3.0 (1)   🤔1.0 (1)
An early Ravensburger children puzzle with pictures from a picture book with art from A. and M. Provensen. I named the puzzle as it appears in the old Ravensburger catalogs, although only one of the three puzzles has actually something to do with a city. The other puzzles motifs go untitled. As to the puzzle itself I was very surprised that this was a 7x7 (49 pieces) puzzle and not a 6x6 (36 pieces puzzle) as I had expected from info from catalogs. My guess is that this is the very first box version (just saying "Puzzle" on the cover) and the later editions of the Provensen series became 36 pieces, because by then Ravensburger already had other 49 pieces puzzles in production (e.g. the 3 city puzzle series). I do not like the artstyle of the pictures. The quality of the puzzle pieces however was really good for its age. All in all I give it an average 3 of 5 stars.
by Stefan 2025-12-01
Submitted 2026-06-13
Information provided by