Hieronymus Bosch, whose real name was Jheronimus (or Jeroen) van Aken (meaning "from Aachen"), was born to a family of Dutch and German painters. Most of his life was spent in Brabant, a flourishing fifteenth century city, in the south of the present day Netherlands. When he was 13 years old, there was a catastrophic fire destroying over 4000 homes and the young Bosch may have witnessed this event, contributing to some of the highly imaginative paintings he would later paint.

Many referred to him as a "painter of devils" and an inventor of nonsense, full of satirical meaning but upon closer examination, Bosch had a great insight into the mind and an extraordinary ability to depict symbols of life and creation.

Bosch was a pessimistic moralist who had no illusions about human nature nor any confidence in the kindness of a man-made corrupted world. With the use of complex, imaginative, demons, half-human animals, and machines, Bosch evokes a sense of fear and confusion in the evils of man. Many of his symbolic figures and iconography were obscure even in his own time.

Bosch's paintings are hard to definitely date. Out of the 25 paintings attributed to him, only 7 are signed and none are dated. Hieronymus Bosch techniques were uniquely his own and while there have been a host of imitators, his visual style was so unique, it prevented his having any real followers.

Bosch used many of the same methods of other masters in his day, of drawing and then tracing his drawing to a chalk ground, flesh colored prined panel. He also used this ground as part of the finished piece. Then hhe added a few techniques of his own. For example, he applied a second chalk ground over his initial tracing on the panel which added a brilliance to his painting not previously seen. Unlike his peers, Bosch was NOT CONCERNED with a description of detail, light or perspective, but was more concerned with an expression of form. This was highly unusual for an artist during his time.

Bosch also strayed from his peers with the use of white. He used white much heavier to achieve color effects in a single application rather than on built-up layers. The white is accented by its loaded brushstrokes and the texture of these strokes show on the painting. This rough surface was very much in contrast to others who used the traditional style of Flemish painting where the smooth surface attempted to hide the fact that the painting was man-made, such as the Flemish artist Jan van Eyck, whose paintings were executed to a highly finished and smooth degree.

Hieronymus Boschs' preoccupation with the evils of the world did not dismiss his own unique vision of a world full of beauty. With his own unique style, nearly 400 years later, he would be the inspiration for the surrealist movement of the twentieth century.