DIES IRAE, DIES ILLA [534]

"The Temptation of St Anthony"

Once I was finally able to stand in front of the triptychs by Hieronymus Bosch that I was fortunate to see in Belgium, I came to realise that the level of detail in them was overwhelming. That said, I spent most of that trip with aching legs and feet from all the walking, every gallery visit being punctuated by finding opportunities to sit down for a bit, so the whole trip had its overwhelming moments.

I should have known all of this ahead of time. Having heard the term “triptych” more when talking about groups of large canvasses by Francis Bacon, what I am seeing here are altar pieces, cabinets made to be opened for the benefit of a single person, or small group of people, a level of intimacy wrecked by displaying them permanently open behind a wall of glass. I only realised once back home that another painting was on the outer panels of “The Last Judgement” on display at the Groeningemuseum in Bruges, known as “Christ Crowned with Thorns”.

But the details... a hump-backed bird, with Goofy-like dog ears and wooden skis, carrying a letter on its beak wearing a red robe a hat comprising a funnel with a branch coming out of it, a bauble hanging from a branch (“The Temptation of St. Anthony”); a being comprised of a human head with legs coming from its metal shell, an arm coming out of the top holding a sword (“The Last Judgement”); a monk-like figure with a large head and no arms walks with a frame on wheels, an antenna coming out of their head (“The Temptation of St. Anthony”); a hooded blacksmith about to bring their hammer on a naked body slumped over their anvil (“The Last Judgement”).

Detail from "The Last Judgement"

No amount of description, and no amount of choice, will ever do justice describing the sheer... amount of imagery there is. Looking through Stefan Fischer’s book of the complete works of Bosch, as published by Taschen, the many pages that zoom in on detail, for example printing the dog-bird larger than it is in the painting, would make you think Bosch completed hundreds of paintings, despite only 25-30 works attributed to him or his atelier still being extant. The examination of his work, and the endless reproduction of it – of course we could have bought figurines of details from Bosch works in the gallery shops after seeing the real thing – truly makes every frame a painting.

I initially had the impression of the imagery of the hellscapes depicted in these altar pieces being an extension of the medieval doodles made in monastery documents by scribes, known as “marginalia” or “drolleries”, all strange creatures and people with trumpets coming out of their behinds. As much as I mentioned Bosch’s “personal inventiveness of his surreal imagery” last time, and wondering if there is a similar building of symbolism as would be found at the Magritte Museum, next door to “The Temptation of St. Anthony”,  bigger indicator was its subsequent influence, as indicated by Jan Provoost’s own “Last Judgement” featuring similar hellish imagery in one corner only a decade after Bosch’s death, and in the composition of more realist works by Pieter Bruegel the Elder.

The presence of this imagery helps to decentralise the subject of each painting overall – Jesus is pushed to the top of “The Last Judgement”, and St. Anthony is to the right in his depiction, their depictions no longer than other elements in each work. You are forced to look everywhere, from left to right, from up to down, taking in the whole, zeroing in on detail, then considering the external artwork. The hellish imagery could indicate an inevitability of evil, or even its ultimate triumph, but having hundreds of years to get used to seeing such imagery, reproduced in any form, could indicate its inevitable slide into banality.

The most famous of all Bosch works is “The Garden of Earthly Delights”, which I have not mentioned only because I did not see it on my trip – it is found in Madrid, Spain, or across numerous gift items at the Groeningemuseum, when I was expecting them to have a “Last Judgement” notebook at the very least.

Detail from "The Temptation of St Anthony"