Hieronymus Bosch (World of Art)

No one can look at the paintings of Hieronymous Bosch without amazement and bewilderment. What induced the artist to fill his canvases wth such scenes of torture, such monsters, such leering devils? Why does a sense of misery and foreboding pervade all his works?


Professor Gibson shows that what seems inexplicable to us today was perfectly intelligible to the fifteenth-century viewer. The subjects of Bosch's paintings were in fact the overwhelming concerns of late medieval Europe: The Last Judgement, original sin, death, temptations of the flesh.

The author describe each picture in detail, explaining how the complicated symbolism can be understood with reference to medieval folklore and religion. He also points out that many of the acts portrayed in the pictures were visual translations of of verbal puns and metaphors.