34
The Garden of Delights

The artwork
date
1490 - 1500
details
Oil, oak panels
Links
- Image Copyright
- Wikipedia
- In the museum
Andre Breton, 1957
Why we love it
This work is a real madness, you can spend hours in front of it and you will always discover something new.
It consists of three panels all united by the theme of sin, that address the destiny of humanity, with the Paradise of Adam and Eve, another Paradise deceptive to the senses, and Hell in the right panel.
In addition, when the painting is closed on the outside there is a painting in grisaille that alludes to the third day of the creation of the world.
The “tree-man” looking directly at the viewer is believed to be a self-portrait of the artist, but this is another unsolved mystery surrounding the painting.
Considered an exception to the painting of its time, and one of the most fascinating, mysterious and attractive works in the history of art, the Bosch style was an immediate success, copied by artists of his time such as Pieter Bruegel, and much later by the surrealist movement with artists like Salvador Dalí or Joan Miró.