HIERONYMUS BOSCH
The Italian Northern Renaissance artist, Hieronymus Bosch was born in c. 1450. He lived in Holland all his life. His works are extremely surrealistic, raw, and detailed oil paintings that take place in our world, mostly. I say mostly because I am just talking about the backdrop, not considering the supernatural aspects to the paintings. I like how his paintings have an overall emotion/tone to them, either good and/or evil. There is a life that coexists with heaven, hell, and what consequences humans face (for example Adam and Eve below). He paints with a creative touch of “majestic” outlook, by doing so he painted people or beings with unusual attributes.
The Garden of Earthly Delights:
This piece is a great representation of his works overall. There is lightness and darkness and what I mean by that is perceivable “good” and “evil”. The name that was given to his triptych by modern society was The Garden of Earthly Delights . Below is a take on a representation of Bosh’s ideals of equality. That there is no difference of humans, animals, and plants. We live together under one universe. The 3 panels can be identified as the beginning of time (Adam and Eve), current state, and the aftermath (hell). In fact, I take it as we live together and exist in one eternity. I say this because his whole piece is built up of the life/death, heaven/hell, and the supernatural.
The Garden of Earthly Delights
Oil on wood, 220×389 cm. Museo del Prado, Madrid, Spain.
https://www.italian-renaissance-art.com/Hieronymus-Bosch.html
Interpretation:
The image of the bird eating the humans (and so much more pictured below), is said to represent the ideals from The 7 Deadly Sins.
Derived Inspiration:
Hieronymus Bosch’s paintings have a point of view from the Humanist side. Mostly, he is showing that in the first panel, there are choices (like free will) and Adam and Eve represent those choices to do good or evil. The middle panel is the life that exists all together, it can be seen that Bosch was unhappy with the decisions our society was making, and that the third panel is a reminder that there are consequences for those bad actions or not living morally.
Works Cited
Barker, Vicki. “Hieronymus Bosch Died 500 Years Ago, But His Art Will Still Creep You Out.” NPR, NPR, 26 June 2016, www.npr.org/2016/06/26/483225865/hieronymus-bosch-died-500-years-ago-but-his-art-will-still-creep-you-out.
Finnan, Vincent. “Hieronymus Bosch Painter of the Garden of Earthly Delights.” Italian Renaissance Art.com, www.italian-renaissance-art.com/Hieronymus-Bosch.html.
Hickson, Sally. “Bosch, The Garden of Earthly Delights.” Khan Academy, Khan Academy, www.khanacademy.org/humanities/renaissance-reformation/northern /hieronymus-bosch/a/bosch-the-garden-of-earthly-delights.
Prodger, Michael. “How Hieronymus Bosch Defied the Ideals of an Age.” New Statesman, www.newstatesman.com/culture/art-design/2016/03/how-hieronymus-bosch-defied-ideals-age.
Emily's Art Class Blog 
I really enjoyed learning more about this piece. I did not realize that hell was even part of the picture. I had never really looked at the pain on the right before reading your assessment. This is possible because I have an aversion from chaos, so I tend to look at the left pain more to avoid the chaos in the middle. After reading your assessment of the piece I feel like I not only learned a lot about the painting but also about Bosch. This is a interesting piece of art but i don’t think i could ever have something so busy on my wall.
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I really admire your descriptions of the meaning behind the painting. I agree, I don’t think Bosch was pleased with the human condition. I sort of look at this painting as a timeline. First we see god introducing Adam and Eve, then in the second, people partaking in pleasure and fulfillment, and then hell and punishment in the third. Something that surprised me is that when the painting panels are closed, there is another painting on the outside, which depicts god creating the world. This painting closes like a book, which makes it even more incredible. I really enjoy the small abstract details in this painting.
Thanks for sharing!
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Sorry if the website is saying that I commented more than once, I was gonna share a few interesting links with you about Hieronymus but for some reason the website is glitching and won’t let me comment what i want to comment, but anyways love the post Emily! I’m not sure if other Northern renaissance artists used the same vibrant colors that Hieronymus Bosch used. To me it gives the paintings a cartoon feel to them. As some of our other classmates mentioned in the comments I also had no idea that the third panel of the Garden of earthly delights was hell. That is super interesting. I really liked how you described how Bosch wanted us to see that the panels kind of told a story where god gives us all this freedom but if we choose wrong choices, there can be consequences. I have never seen the painting of the bird eating the human before. It is such a weird and strange painting but I love it just because of how odd it is. I was super curious about this artist after reading your post, so I did a little bit more research online and found this really interesting painting by him of an owl and a man. If you type in “Hieronymus Bosch owl painting” and click on images, it should pop up. I think the owl in this painting is supposed to represent the devil, but I thought it was interesting that he painted a lot of birds! Again, the website is being super glitching so sorry if I commented on this like ten times, I was trying to put in a link for the his owl painting but it wasn’t working!
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