Hieronymus Bosch

Hieronymus Bosch (c. 1450–1516) created some of the strangest, most unsettling images in Western art. Born Jheronimus van Aken in 's-Hertogenbosch, a town in the Duchy of Brabant (now the Netherlands), he took his surname from his birthplace. His grandfather, father, and four uncles were all painters. By 1481 he had married Aleid van de Meervenne, a wealthy woman whose fortune allowed him financial independence. He joined the Illustrious Brotherhood of Our Blessed Lady, a religious confraternity, and remained in 's-Hertogenbosch his entire life.

Bosch's paintings overflow with bizarre hybrid creatures, demons, and macabre imagery that still puzzles scholars. His three great triptychs, The Garden of Earthly Delights, The Haywain, and The Temptation of St. Anthony, depict humanity's moral corruption with hallucinatory detail. His hell scenes feature fish swallowing men, musical instruments used as torture devices, and demons dressed as nuns. No clear documentary evidence explains his symbolism, and his meaning has been debated for centuries. Some see him as a Northern Renaissance moralist warning against sin. Others have called him a heretic, an alchemist, or simply a genius entertainer.

Philip II of Spain acquired many of Bosch's paintings, which explains why the Museo del Prado in Madrid holds the finest collection. The Garden of Earthly Delights hung at El Escorial for 342 years before moving to the Prado in 1939. Other works survive at the National Gallery in London and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. Only about 25 paintings are confidently attributed to him today. His imagery later influenced Pieter Bruegel the Elder and, centuries later, Salvador Dalí and the Surrealists.