For more years: Jheronimus Bosch – Visioenen van een genie

Excerpts from the Noordbrabants Museum english pamphlet:

This exhibition is an unparalleled tribute to one of the most important medieval artists from the Netherlands. It is the largest survey of the work of Jheronimus Bosch (c. 1450-1516) ever shown. For one time only, the majority of his oeuvre is returning to 's-Hertogenbosch, the city where he was born as Jheronimus van Aken, where he painted his masterpieces and from which he borrowed his professional surname of 'Bosch'. The exhibition is the high point of Jheronimus Bosch 500-a series of events organised in 2016 to mark the 500th anniversary of the artist's death.

Jheronimus Bosch died at the beginning of August in 1516 in his native 's-Hertogenbosch. He was about 65 years old. Bosch was married to Aleid van de Meervenne, who outlived her husband by more than six years at their home on the well-to-do north side of the city'smain square, the Markt. The couple did not have children. There is no evidence that Bosch had a workshop at their house: his paintings were probably produced at the family workshop at his parental home nearby. His father, uncles and cousins were also active there as painters, although not a single piece of their work has survived. Jheronimus-known familiarly as Jeroen or Joen-was the genius of the family.

Each of us has to make our way through life as a kind of pilgrimage-a long journey full of temptations and dangers. The devil has laid traps everywhere, making the world a dangerous and immoral place from which the pilgrim should keep as wide a distance as possible. Yet we have no choice but make our way through it, choosing between good and evil every day. And when the end comes, each will have to give account. Jheronimus Bosch painted life's pilgrim on the outside of the Haywain Triptych and the Wayfarer Triptych.

The market town of s'-Hertengobosch experienced an economic upturn in the late 15th Century, which boosted the prosperity of its citizens. It was precisely during this pperiod that Jheronimus Bosch emerged as a highly exceptional artist. He thought and painted differently to those who preceded him, and this in a town with no distinctive artistic tradition of its own. All the same, a great deal of work was going on at the late-Gothic St. John's Church, led by the architect and engraver Alart Duhameel from the Southern Netherlands. The arts flourished elsewhere in the town too: silversmiths, book illuminators, sculptors and printers were all highly active. Artworks were also imported by the many monasteries and chapels, the guilds, the city council and wealthy burghers.

The Modern Devotion flourished during Jheronimus Bosch's lifetime, especially in the Low Countries. The religious movement wanted to bring the Christian faith closer to the individual. The Bible was translated into Dutch and worshipers could pray in their own language, so they could truly understand the content of their prayers. The same spirit is found in Bosch's paintings. He communicated the essence of religious scenes in a direct and moving way through his brilliant ability to represent emotions. He took episodes that were extremely familiar and gave them back their dramatic tension. Bosch's paintings almost always possess multiple layers of meaning and still demand attentive viewing today.

Jheronimus Bosch is known to most people primarily as a painter. This is understandable, but not entirely correct. He is in fact the fact the first artist from the Netherlands by whom a body of drawings has survived. What's more, Bosch treated drawing as an art form in its own right, rather than simply as a means of preparing or recording paintings. Drawing was an important medium that enabled him to express his creativity and set down his visions.
The body of drawings attributed to Bosch is not large but is very distinctive. Until recently, a mere 11 sheets were ascribed to him. We believe the total to be 21, of which 19 are included in this exhibition. The show piece is the recently discovered Bosch drawing from a private collection, which has never been shown in public before.

Veneration of the saints was particularly intense in the period in which Jheronimus Bosch lived, and he continued to work within the existing visual tradition when representing them. His clients and contempories had to be able, after all, to recognize the depicted saints if they were to be able to pray to them. It is clear at the same time, however, that Bosch gave his own personal and creative interpretation to this tradition.
He repeatedly painted St. Jerome, his own namesake, St. Anthony, that of his father, both of whom were popular in the late Middle Ages. Each of the two saints spent part of his life in solitude, living in the wilderness as a hermit.

Judgement Day has come and life on earth is about to cease. It is the End of Days and the beginning of eternal life and eternal death. Christ will decide the fate of every soul, separating the good people from the bad. The blessed will go to heaven, the damned will disappear into hell. No one knows when the day will come. Bosch holds up this image of the future to make viewers of the painting reflect on their deeds: where precisely are they heading?