'Garden of Earthly Delights' by Bosch. Analysis.

'Garden of Earthly Delights' Analysis

Hieronymus Bosch (Netherlands, 1450–1516)

The painting to be analysed is the most popular and ambitious masterpiece of the Netherlander, Hieronymus Bosch, `The Garden of Heavenly Delights’. This is an allegoric landscape painting organized as triptych composition dating from between 1450 and 1516. These pictures as a whole respond to the Flemish School ideals, on one hand the importance of nature and landscape by means of rivers, mountains and caves; and on the other hand the richness of vivid colours and textures. One of the main features of this Dutch painter is his fantastical, often monstrous, hybrid creatures who might in some ways be seen as a forerunner of the Surrealists. You can find the influences of this painting in some of Dalí's pieces of work in the detail illustration below.

‘The Garden of Heavenly Delights’ is composed of three scenes, which are probably but not necessarily intended to be read chronologically from left to right. The left panel is a broad view of socially engaged nude figures, as well as fantastical and oversized animals and fruits. This main picture gives name to the masterpiece by showing the pleasures and sins of human worldly living. Last but not least, the right panel illustrates the horrors of Hell, the place where sinners pay for what they did on Earth. Life, faith, happiness and hope fade away as light and colours come to darkness from the left to the right side.

The 'Prince of Hell' feeds with the sinners.

It seems obvious that the artist wants to symbolize the perils of life’s temptations as a warning for what may come after our life on Earth.