Hieronymus Bosch

Jheronimus (or Jerome) van Aken lived and worked in the small town of Hertogenbosch in the Netherlands. He took the surname of Bosch from his hometown, and became the celebrated artist known to all as Hieronymus Bosch. His fantastical paintings, most of which were depictions of the horrors of Hell, were avidly collected by the rich nobles and royal art enthusiasts in Europe during his lifetime.

His oil paintings and their printed copies found their way all through the Netherlands and Austria, and even as far away as Spain. Flemish artist Pieter Bruegel the Elder, who was born a decade after Bosch's death, was known to paint imitations of a large number of Bosch's popular paintings. There was a written record from 1504 commissioning Bosch to make an altarpiece of the Last Judgment, and it was initiated by Philip the Handsome, who was later to become the King of Castille. Bosch was not known to be a traveling artist, as many artists of his day were, and he stayed very close to home in Hertogenbosch during his life.

In 1474, Bosch and his siblings (a sister and two brothers) were named in record kept by the city of Hertogenbosch, but not a lot of personal information is known about Bosch, other than that he was a member of a very orthodox religious sect, called the Brotherhood of Our Lady. He seems to have inherited his artistic talent from his family, especially from his grandfather, Jan van Aken, who died when Bosch was around four years old. Jan van Aken had been a painter of note, and his name was found in records dating back to the year 1430. Four of Jan's five sons, which included Bosch's father, Anthonius, were also painters. Anthonius, who died around 1478, had a connection to the Brotherhood of Our Lady as an artistic adviser, which may have later influenced Bosch to also join the sect. The art works of the van Aken family seem to have been lost, or just never discovered, but there is a premise that either Bosch's father, or perhaps one of his uncles, had been responsible for teaching young Bosch how to paint.

His paintings and altarpieces were all of a religious nature, full of symbolism and imagination; demons and saints in conflict were his main themes. The Temptation of St. Anthony is one such painting that stands out among Bosch’s fantastical works, for which he received much fame and notoriety. Unlike the more traditional religious pieces which give inspiration to mankind, Bosch’s works are depressing and sinister, showing the unavoidable and painful fall of man into the depths of Hell.

Bosch’s name was signed on all of his works, but none of the paintings were dated on the canvas. Many of his altarpieces have been lost or destroyed, including the ones that he had painted for St. John’s Cathedral in Hertogenbosch. It is very difficult, if not impossible to chronicle his works in the order that he produced them. A few of his existing paintings have been dated through other means, such as records: The Extraction of the Stone of Madness (The Cure of Folly) (1475-1480) which is in the Museo del Prado in Madrid, St. John on Patmos (1485) now in the Gemaldegalerie in Berlin, and The Path of Life (1500-1502) is at the Academie für Bildenden Künste, Vienna, Austria.