A Study of the Medieval Artist - Hieronymus Bosch #1 | A Mixed Media Art Project

For my current mixed media art project, I wanted to share an unusual collection of items that are unique. I recently became familiar with the Dutch artist, Hieronymus Bosch and his works.

I discovered that Hieronymus Bosch was actually born Jheronimus van Aken in 1450. He died August 9, 1516. Brabant was the area he is known to have lived.

He is reported to be one of the most notable representatives of the Early Netherlandish painting school.

His name "Jheronimus" actually means "with a sacred name" given to him by his mother. He comes from a line of artists as his grandfather, father, and brothers all excelled as painters.

Since no formal training can be attributed to his success, it was widely believed that either his grandfather and/or father taught him to paint and encouraged his skills.

His work, generally oil on oak wood, mainly contains fantastic illustrations of religious concepts and narratives.

His paintings were collected in the Netherlands, Austria, and Spain. All were widely copied. Interest in his bizarre representation, sometimes viewed as macabre and nightmarish depictions of hell, was widespread.

As reported in Wiki, much of Bosch's work documents the contemporary medieval period, with interpretations of hell and suffering if one lives a life of sin. He shows you the consequences of your thoughts and actions. It's noted that his work focuses on themes such as temptation, sin and judgement.

It's worth noting that according to art scholars, the art of the older masters of art was viewed as based in the physical world of everyday experience. However, these same scholars believed Bosch confronted those experiences with an alternative view, in the words of the art historian Walter Gibson, "a world of dreams and nightmares in which forms seem to flicker and change before our eyes".

I can see this dream and nightmare viewpoint as being substantiated if one cares to examine the formless shapes where gender is obscured and animals appear to possess two or three-dimensional forms characteristic of chimeras.

Today, Bosch is seen as a highly individualistic painter. His works have been attributed to an artist with deep insight into humanity's desires and deepest fears. In my view, many of the human subjects in his art are naked with elongated bodies or limbs. Their facial features are distorted as if terrorized by some trauma.

His most acclaimed works, "The Garden of Earthly Delights" is a fantastical array of humans and animals at play.

^Source

Many scholars have attempted to interpret Bosch's works and attempt to place them in a category of not being of serious consequence. This has lead to many labeling his works as just scandalous and for amusement since the human and animal depictions and oftentimes situations are exaggerated for effect.

^Source

In my first project study of Bosch, researching the paintings and viewing their details, I wanted to see how the stable diffusion program, StarryAI, handled a prompt that called for strange animals and humans. I used the following text description and received eight images with a mixture of humans and animals. I usually choose Fantasy as the style when retrieving images. For this project, I chose Real Vision XL.

Starry AI Text input:
"Strange distorted creatures in lively distorted colors of fantasy in the realm of Bosch."

Style: RealVisXL
Iterations: 50
Seed: 3097432838

StarryAI Results:

Some amazing images were produced. I was excited to see the results, so started immediately working on mixed media projects.

I decided to perform three separate sets of projects depicting different combinations of humans and animals. In addition to the main image of the theme, the resulting images from StarryAI are all colorful and contain numerous details with which to draw themes. I did notice, however, that StarryAI picked up the hues that are prevalent in Bosch's drawings, orange, browns, and emerald.

Below are my first set of projects I designed using some of the images from the prompt above.

PROJECT #1: Mirror, Mirror

For Project #1, placed as my thumbnail image, I utilized the third Version 2 image of my prompt for strange distorted creatures. I could see the mirror with the fantasy world inside and envision a strange female who loves strange animals, desiring to explore it. Adding two additional Bosh styled animals added to the strangeness of the female, as I placed on on her shoulder. For the female, I wanted to retrieve it as a stable diffusion image, so I chose StarryAI again.

#1

PROJECT #2: Perspectives

In Project #2, "Perspectives", I wanted to highlight different figures that display reactions. I utilized two of the animals produced by the prompt. I also placed a pure fractal veil over the project and other fractals at the bottom to further the distortion and dreamlike quality. The alien and female are connected as they seem to share a common insight into the unknown as shown by the chain link. Look at the expression of each.

The female stable diffusion image characterizes the essence of my prompt in StarryAI, "Beautiful woman with flowing hair stooping down with long arms flailing, bulging eyes. Clothing is flowing outward." A splash of red on her cheek signifies some type of trauma. Even the alien butterfly has a distorted form that seems to represent a female.

#2

PROJECT #3: Dystopian Water Supply

In Project #3, "Dystopian Water Supply", I wanted to work with the apocalyptic theme as I love this genre of fiction writing. I chose the third image from Version 1 of the prompt. The overall image seems to suggest that one can escape into a fantasy world from the desolation and barren dystopian one.

You can choose in which world you'd like to reside; one with no possibility of a future, or one in which fantasy rules. Adapting to either is worrisome. I think I'd choose the dystopian world. At least, I may not have to change into the form the creature represents.

#3

PROJECT #4: Runway

I thoroughly enjoyed working on Project #4, "Runway", that depicts two models with opposite viewpoints on their design choices. One model prefers a sleeveless gown with a cape. The other prefers a cloak. They both, however, love the dress designer with the Bosch animal representations. The model with the grass designer dress was created in StarryAI utilizing the starter image Contributed to the #LIL database by @mballesteros.

I love the flowing hairstyles provided by StarryAI for the model.

#4

PROJECT #5: YIKES! It's A Balancing Act

For Project #5, I wanted to have a bit of fun with one of the animals that I utilized from Version 2 of the prompt. I chose image 4 for the fact that this animal exhibited a terrifying look on its face. It was perfect for what I had planned for its adventure.

Having to stay afloat if your life depended upon it is something akin to a balancing act. The snake in the water provided all the incentive this poor animal needed to stay above water and out of danger. His situation does seem a bit precarious, though. His family isn't taking any chances. They're staying secure on dry land, hopefully.

#5

Thanks for taking the time to view my post. I hope you like my mixed media art project #1 for the artist Bosch.

I created 5 Bosch-interpreted project. I'd like to know in the comments below which project you liked best.

To document my project, below are the sources I included in each individual creation to accompany the Bosch images.