hieronymus bosch

Hieronymus Bosch, (latinized; also Jeroen Bosch or his real name Jeroen van Aken) (c. 1450 – August, 1516) was a prolific Dutch painter of the 15th and 16th centuries. Many of his works depict sin and human moral failings. Bosch used images of demons, half-human animals and machines to evoke fear and confusion to portray the evil of man. The works contain complex, highly original, imaginative, and dense use of symbolic figures and iconography, some of which was obscure even in his own time. He is said to have been an inspiration for the surrealist movement in the 20th century.

His true name was Jheronimus (or Jeroen) van Aken (meaning "from Aachen"). He signed some of his paintings with Bosch (pronounced as Boss in Dutch), derived from his birthplace 's-Hertogenbosch. In Spanish he is often called El Bosco.

Born to a family of Dutch and German painters, he spent most of his life in 's-Hertogenbosch, a flourishing city in fifteenth century Brabant, in the south of the present-day Netherlands. In 1463, some 4000 houses in the town were destroyed by a catastrophic fire, which the then (approximately) 13-year-old Bosch may have witnessed. This might have been a contributing factor to his obsession with Hell. He became a popular painter and even received commissions from abroad. In 1488 he joined the Brotherhood of Our Lady, an arch-conservative religious group of some 40 influential citizens of 's-Hertogenbosch and some 7000 'outer-members' from all over Europe.

Style and works

He produced several triptychs, works of three paintings on wooden panels that are attached to each other. Among his most famous is The Garden of Earthly Delights. This triptych depicts paradise with Adam and Eve and many wondrous animals on the left panel, the earthly delights with numerous nude figures and tremendous fruit and birds on the middle panel, and hell with depictions of fantastic punishments of the various types of sinners on the right panel. When the exterior panels are closed the viewer can see, painted in grisaille, God creating the earth.

These paintings have a rough surface from the application of paint; this contrasts with the traditional Flemish style of paintings, where the smooth surface attempts to hide the fact that the painting is man-made.

Toward the end of his life, Bosch's style changed and he created paintings with a small number of large figures who appear to almost leave the painting and stand close to the observer. An example is Christ Crowned with Thorns.

Bosch never dated his paintings and may have signed only some of them (other signatures are certainly not his). All in all, about 25 paintings remain today that are attributed to him. Philip II of Spain acquired many of Bosch's paintings after the painter's death; as a result, the Prado Museum in Madrid now owns several of his works, including The Garden of Earthly Delights.

Pieter Brueghel the Elder was influenced by Bosch's work and produced several paintings in a similar style, for instance the 1562 work The Triumph of Death.

List of works

Many of Bosch's works have been given multiple names when translated.

Triptychs

• Haywain (1500–1515)
• The Garden of Earthly Delights (after 1466)
• The Temptation of St. Anthony
• The Last Judgement (after 1482)
• The Epiphany (The Adoration of the Magi) (1510)
• The Crucifixion of St Julia

Triptych fragments

• Christ Carrying the Cross (Madrid version)
• Christ Carrying the Cross (1515-1516)
• The Last Judgement (1506-08)
• A triptych dating after 1494, now separated that once consisted of:
  • The Ship of Fools
  • Allegory of Gluttony and Lust
  • Death of the Miser

Paintings

• Adoration of the Child
• Christ Carrying the Cross (1480s)
• Christ Crowned with Thorns (1495-1500)
• Christ Crowned with Thorns (El Escorial version)
• Crucifixion With a Donor (after 1483)
• Death of the Reprobate
• Ecce Homo (after 1476)
• Ecce Homo (1490s)
• St. Jerome at Prayer (c. 1505)
• St. Christopher Carrying the Christ Child (1490–1500)
• St. John the Baptist in the Wilderness (after 1495)
• St. John the Evangelist on Patmos (after 1490)
• The Conjurer (1500s)
• The Extraction of the Stone of Madness (The Cure of Folly) (after 1500)
• The Marriage Feast at Cana (1500)
• The Seven Deadly Sins and the Four Last Things (1500–1510)
• The Wayfarer
• A series of four panels in the Palazzo Ducale in Venice all dating after 1490
  • Ascent of the Blessed
  • Terrestrial Paradise
  • Fall of the Damned
  • Hell

Drawings

• Animal Studies
• Beehive and Witches
• Beggars
• Beggars and Cripples
• Christ Carrying The Cross
• Death of the Miser
• Group of Male Figures
• Mary and John at the Foot of the Cross
• Nest of Owls
• Portrait of Hieronymus Bosch
• Scenes in Hell
• Studies
• Studies of Monsters
• Temptation of St Anthony
• The Entombment
• The Hearing Forest and the Seeing Field
• The Ship of Fools
• The Ship of Fools in Flames
• Tree-Man
• Two Caricatured Heads
• Two Monsters
• Two Witches
• Witches

Trivia

• In 2004 Bosch ended on the 63rd place in the election of De Grootste Nederlander (The Greatest Dutchman)
• The movie The Man In The Glass Booth (1975), starring Maximilian Schell, features a print of Bosch's Garden of Earthly Delights, which the main character discusses.
• The artwork for the self-titled 1969 album by Deep Purple features Bosch's The Garden of Earthly Delights.
• The music video for "Until It Sleeps", off the album Load by Metallica, seems to have been inspired by Bosch paintings, especially Hell. The bloated blue figure in the bottom right hand corner of the Hell triptych, seen seated in a golden chair and consuming a human figure, is prominently featured and easily recognisible in the music video.
• Bosch's The Last Judgement is featured in the third book of the Remnants series as a 3D environment derived from the painting.
• The artwork for the first album by the band Savage Garden features work by Bosch throughout.
• A character called Hieronymus Bosch ('Ronny') appears in Tom Holt's book Faust Among Equals, working as an engineer in Hell.
• Many of the novels by Michael Connelly feature a main character by the name of Hieronymus "Harry" Bosch, who was named after the painter. In Connelly's 2001 novel, A Darkness More Than Night, the paintings of Hieronymus Bosch play a significant role in the plot.
• A hip-hop artist named "Bigg Jus" [1] has a song on his album "Poor People's Day" called "Illustrations of Hieronymus Bosch... that 1467 shit" [2].
• There is a children's picture book called Pish, Posh, Said Hieronymus Bosch, which tells the story of the painter and his girlfriend living in their house with many of Bosch's creature creations coming to life (this drives his girlfriend crazy, and she temporarily leaves him).
• In Janet Fitch's 2006 novel Paint It Black, she references Bosch's work in several chapters as being an influence on the main character's boyfriend.
• In Christopher Rice's 2004 novel The Snow Garden one of the storylines throughout the book deals with Hieronymus Bosch's work The Garden of Earthly Delights and his possible link with the Brethren of the Free Spirit.
• In the film What Dreams May Come, many of the scenes depicted in hell were inspired by Bosch's imagery, particularly The Garden of Earthly Delights.
• The English rock group XTC has a track on their album Oranges and Lemons called "The Garden of Earthly Delights."
• The Swedish group Vox Vulgaris plays the music of Bosch, based on the notes found in The Garden of Earthly Delights on one track on their album The Shape of Medieval Music to Come.

Bibliography

• Jos Koldeweij/Bernard Vermet/Barbera van Kooij: Hieronymus Bosch. New Insights Into His Life and Work ISBN 90-5662-214-5, NAi Publishers, Rotterdam 2001, ISBN 90-5662-214-5.
• Lynda Harris: 'The Secret Heresy of Hieronymus Bosch', Floris Books, Edinburgh, 1995