The Disturbing Paintings of Hieronymus Bosch — Transcript

Full transcript

1. 0:00[Music]
2. 0:06there is no other artist quite like
3. 0:08herous Bosch whilst D Vinci was
4. 0:10finishing the Mona Lisa and Michelangelo
5. 0:13was decorating the cistin chapel this
6. 0:15Dutch painter was Conjuring up
7. 0:17nightmarish hellscapes full of grotesque
8. 0:19and nonsensical creatures but why did
9. 0:22this artist create such disturbing
10. 0:24paintings are they the product of a
11. 0:26lively imagination or are they the
12. 0:28result of a troubled mind afflicted by
13. 0:31intense and frightening hallucinations
14. 0:33let's investigate the paintings of
15. 0:35heronimus Bosch and get a glimpse of the
16. 0:37artist behind his strange and unsettling
17. 0:42work very little is known about the life
18. 0:44of heronimus Bosch even his portrait
19. 0:47which you can see now was made 30 years
20. 0:49after his death we do know that he was
21. 0:51born sometime during the mid 1400s and
22. 0:54probably spent most of his life in the
23. 0:56Dutch town of satos he grew up in a time
24. 0:59of Deep religious anxiety in late
25. 1:01medieval Christianity ideas about Sin
26. 1:04death and the devil were becoming more
27. 1:06sophisticated and descriptions of hell
28. 1:09like in Dante's Inferno were becoming
29. 1:11more Vivid there was a genuine fear that
30. 1:13demonic forces lived amongst the
31. 1:15population a fear that led to the first
32. 1:17European witch hunts something that
33. 1:19would only increase in the coming
34. 1:21centuries this was the spiritual
35. 1:23environment that tonomous Bosch emerged
36. 1:25from one where devotion and fear were
37. 1:28intertwined it is clear to have affected
38. 1:30him deeply as a preoccupation with sin
39. 1:33and Punishment pervade his work let's
40. 1:36start with his most well-known painting
41. 1:38The Garden of Earthly Delights it's a
42. 1:40tryptic with three panels depicting
43. 1:43three unusual scenes the first on the
44. 1:46left here is based on the biblical story
45. 1:48of Adam and Eve set in the Garden of
46. 1:50Eden we can see familiar animals like
47. 1:53elephants and giraffes but just below
48. 1:55them is a freakish bipedal dog creature
49. 1:58over here a frogged Bird eats a toad and
50. 2:01emerging out of this pool are hideous
51. 2:03multi-headed reptiles even in Paradise
52. 2:07there is already a sense of Discord
53. 2:09anticipating the horrors that lie ahead
54. 2:12the middle panel is a non-biblical scene
55. 2:14featuring hundreds of naked people
56. 2:16frolicking in a lush Garden strange
57. 2:19organic structures dominate the
58. 2:20background giving an otherworldly feel
59. 2:22to it the level of detail is astonishing
60. 2:25but highlights include people crawling
61. 2:27into this giant egg a multi-legged
62. 2:29dancing owl and finally a cute cat-like
63. 2:32unicorn the inhabitants of this panel
64. 2:35seem to be indulging in Acts of lust and
65. 2:37gluttony two of the seven deadly sins
66. 2:41the last panel is a disturbing picture
67. 2:43of hell with all kinds of eccentric and
68. 2:45horrific punishments at the bottom we
69. 2:48have a pig dressed up in a nun's habit
70. 2:50it's attempting to get someone to sign a
71. 2:52pact with the devil this bird demon
72. 2:54consumes its helpless victims and then
73. 2:57defecates them into the cess pool below
74. 2:59over here we have a demonic choir Master
75. 3:02leading a durge crucifying a man on a
76. 3:05giant liar it also appears to be
77. 3:07tattooing music onto someone's backside
78. 3:09some have actually put this to music and
79. 3:11it sounds a bit like
80. 3:14[Music]
81. 3:25this dominating the center we have the
82. 3:27so-called tree man named after his
83. 3:30Stumpy legs some believe that this face
84. 3:32is a self-portrait of the artist there
85. 3:35are so many interpretations to this
86. 3:37piece at large and all the little scenes
87. 3:39have their own theological messages you
88. 3:41could spend hours deciphering even just
89. 3:43one of them but there's an idea that
90. 3:45most people do agree upon it's a warning
91. 3:47against lust and the pursuit of physical
92. 3:52pleasure the fear of sin death and
93. 3:55Punishment are the subjects of many of
94. 3:57Bosch's paintings this includes the last
95. 3:59judgment another tryptic where he
96. 4:01illustrates the apocalyptic scenes from
97. 4:04The Book of Revelation there are lots of
98. 4:06non-biblical elements to this one like
99. 4:08small gnomes and a giant human bird
100. 4:10hybrid but believe it or not it's
101. 4:12actually not too far off the source
102. 4:14material as we've seen from another
103. 4:16video of mine the original biblical
104. 4:18texts include giant human headed locusts
105. 4:20with scorpion Stingers I guess Bosch is
106. 4:23along the right lines painting after
107. 4:25painting Bosch conjures up horrific
108. 4:27scenes each more nonsensical than the
109. 4:29last a trademark of his artwork are the
110. 4:32freakish creatures which can be found in
111. 4:34many of his surviving sketches one of
112. 4:36which includes the tree man seen from
113. 4:38earlier but where on Earth did heronimus
114. 4:41Bosch get his inspiration from there are
115. 4:43many theories but a popular one claims
116. 4:45that he was suffering from intense and
117. 4:47frightening hallucinations an idea which
118. 4:50we can explore through this next piece
119. 4:52many of Bosch's paintings focus on St
120. 4:54Anthony he was a Hermit monk that lived
121. 4:57in the Egyptian desert during the 4th
122. 4:59century according to Christian Legend he
123. 5:01was often tormented by demons this
124. 5:04painting the temptation of St Anthony is
125. 5:06characteristically Bosch it depicts the
126. 5:08trials this saint is rumored to have
127. 5:10endured featuring a plethora of monsters
128. 5:13including this floppy eared ice skating
129. 5:15chicken demon my personal favorite Bosch
130. 5:18made two other paintings about St
131. 5:19Anthony more than any other Saint this
132. 5:22detail could be of significance you see
133. 5:25there is a disease known as St Anthony's
134. 5:27fire you can contract it by eating a
135. 5:29poison black fungus called ergots that
136. 5:32grow on rye crops symptoms include sores
137. 5:35convulsions and a fierce burning
138. 5:37sensation in Limbs and extremities but
139. 5:40another unusual effect of eating OTS are
140. 5:42the frightening and overpowering
141. 5:43hallucinations that can last for hours
142. 5:46at a time they are believed to be behind
143. 5:48the many dancing plagues recorded
144. 5:50throughout the Middle Ages whole towns
145. 5:52would unexplainably dance all day and
146. 5:54night with some dropping dead from
147. 5:56exhaustion in the mid 20th century it
148. 5:59was discovered that when ergots are
149. 6:00baked in an oven they transform into a
150. 6:02form of lysergic acid diamide also known
151. 6:06as LSD some believe that Bosch actually
152. 6:09suffered from St Anthony's fire and may
153. 6:11have based his paintings on his own
154. 6:13frightening hallucinations creating so
155. 6:15many paintings to St Anthony may have
156. 6:18been a form of devotional prayer done so
157. 6:20in the hopes that the saint would rid
158. 6:22him of his debilitating illness it's an
159. 6:24interesting Theory but one that's also
160. 6:27very difficult to prove as mentioned
161. 6:29already
162. 6:30we know practically nothing about
163. 6:31Bosch's life so it's unknown whether he
164. 6:34actually suffered from this disease the
165. 6:36same goes for the arguments that suggest
166. 6:37Bosch was simply insane there just isn't
167. 6:40any evidence to either prove or disprove
168. 6:42it I think there's another explanation
169. 6:45one with a bit more evidence to back it
170. 6:47up heronimus Bosch was not the only
171. 6:49artist painting demons even Michelangelo
172. 6:52did a painting of St Anthony where he's
173. 6:54been lifted up into the air by grotesque
174. 6:56monstrosities both artists come from a
175. 6:58much longer tradition the weird world of
176. 7:01medieval Christian art delving into
177. 7:03Illustrated Bibles and early animal
178. 7:06encyclopedias reveals a whole collection
179. 7:08of strange and frightening imagery
180. 7:10horrific descriptions of Hell grotesque
181. 7:12monsters and demons Galore all of which
182. 7:15predate Bosch and his Renaissance
183. 7:17contemporaries in the margins of many
184. 7:19illuminated manuscripts you can find all
185. 7:22sorts of bizarre monsters some of them
186. 7:24share a passing resemblance to Bosch's
187. 7:26work it's possible likely even that he
188. 7:29reproduced these creatures in his own
189. 7:31work this is certainly the case with
190. 7:33that giraffe as seen earlier art
191. 7:36historians believe that he based it on
192. 7:37an illustration found in an early travel
193. 7:40log comparing the two and they share a
194. 7:42striking resemblance people were drawing
195. 7:44hell and demons long before herous Bosch
196. 7:47was but you could say that he perfected
197. 7:49it a true Renaissance artist he took the
198. 7:51flat illustrations of old and
199. 7:53transformed them by adding perspective
200. 7:55and Vivid color bringing them to life
201. 7:57through his ghoulish imagination
202. 8:00now of course not all of Bosch's
203. 8:01paintings are demonic hellscapes as with
204. 8:04many painters of his time he made
205. 8:05artworks about the life of Jesus or
206. 8:07things that he saw around him but even
207. 8:09in the more mundane topics you're never
208. 8:11too far away from spotting a beasti or
209. 8:13two it is unfortunate that we know next
210. 8:16to nothing about the life of heronimus
211. 8:17Bosch only a shadow of the man through
212. 8:20his paintings it was clear that he had a
213. 8:22dark and vivid imagination and the
214. 8:24matters of religion and morality clearly
215. 8:26occupied his mind after his death in 15
216. 8:29196 the next generation of Dutch artists
217. 8:32were clearly inspired by Bosch's work in
218. 8:34the centuries to follow artists began to
219. 8:36see him as an early Pioneer of
220. 8:38surrealism being one of the first to
221. 8:40draw directly from his imagination
222. 8:43heronimus Bosch's dark apocalyptic
223. 8:45Visions continued to transfix all those
224. 8:48who gazed on his paintings and offer
225. 8:50Bleak glimpses of what awaits Us in the
226. 8:55afterlife hey thanks for watching
227. 8:57heronimus Bosch is one of my favorite
228. 8:59artist artists so I'm thrilled to been
229. 9:01able to make this video I really hope
230. 9:03you enjoyed it too if you like this
231. 9:05video and want to see more why not
232. 9:06subscribe a like and a comment also go a
233. 9:09really long way anyway I look forward to
234. 9:11seeing you next time goodbye
235. 9:14[Music]