Unearthly Delights
Madrid, Spain and the Netherlands have been officially at peace since the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648, but war threatened to erupt between the two nations this spring. The seemingly innocuous occasion of commemorating the 500th anniversary of the death of the great painter Hieronymus Bosch touched off a battle of museums. It all began in February when the Dutch town of ’s-Hertogenbosch (Den Bosch for short)—from which a man born Jheronimus van Aken took his professional name—mounted in its Noordbrabants Museum what it billed as the greatest Bosch exhibition ever seen.
Not to be outdone, Spain's premier art museum, the Prado in Madrid, went all out for the artist known locally as El Bosco with an even greater exhibition, which opened when the Noordbrabants show closed in May and runs until mid-September. At times, the Bosch battle got ugly. Perhaps anticipating the coming competition, the Dutch scholars who curated the Noordbrabants exhibition denied the authenticity of several Bosch paintings the Prado has proudly displayed for years as genuine articles. In retaliation, the Spaniards reneged on their agreement to send one of these paintings to the Noordbrabants exhibition, where it was going to be demoted to a pseudo-Bosch. To its credit, the Prado was still willing to lend their Dutch rivals one of the two greatest of all Bosch paintings, The Haywain. In the end, despite all the controversy, the Treaty of Westphalia is holding.
I didn't make it to the Dutch exhibition, but I'm just back from the one in Madrid. I've spoken to people who did go to the Noordbrabants Museum, and I have looked through its catalogue. Each exhibition can lay claim to items not present in the other: The Dutch had more Bosch drawings, for example, but the Spanish have more Bosch paintings. I wish I had been able to go to both. But in the end, one must award the prize to Madrid. All along, the Prado had its trump card, and it's called The Garden of Earthly Delights. This is the iconic Bosch painting, and indeed one of the most famous paintings in the world. In 1995, on my first trip to Spain, there were two things I wanted to see: (1) The Garden of Earthly Delights and (2) the rest of the country. By withholding its trophy painting, the Prado ensured its triumph over the Noordbrabants Museum. Let's face it: Given two Leonardo exhibitions, the one with the Mona Lisa is going to be the winner.
And make no mistake about it, Madrid is presenting one of the greatest art exhibitions of all time. It offers an opportunity to see simultaneously almost all of Bosch's authentic paintings, and all but one of the greatest of them (it lacks The Last Judgment from Vienna's Academy of Fine Arts). If you're seeking the very definition of a mind-blowing visual experience, make every effort to get to Madrid before this exhibition closes. And if you've already seen many Bosch paintings and are wondering whether this exhibition is really worth the effort, trust me—it is. In my personal obsession of tracking down Bosches, I had previously seen 19 of the 24 Bosch paintings now in Madrid (it's a rough count because of the attribution controversy). Despite my familiarity with many of the paintings, I still was overwhelmed by the experience of seeing them all together, and it was of course a great joy to cross off the remaining items on my personal Bosch bucket list. (There goes my separate trip to Rotterdam.)
It is also worth noting that the paintings are almost all better displayed than they normally are in their home institutions, and that includes the Prado itself. When I first saw The Garden of Earthly Delights and The Haywain in the Prado in 1995, I have to confess that I was disappointed. These paintings that I loved so much from reproductions in books seemed comparatively dull and lifeless in person, almost as if the colors had faded. Imagine my thrill when I saw them burst into life in the Madrid exhibition. I give the credit principally to much brighter and carefully positioned lighting that brings out Bosch's colors in all their vibrancy.
Moreover, some of the paintings have been painstakingly restored in anticipation of these anniversary exhibitions. When I saw the painting now known as the Saint Wilgefortis Triptych in Venice in 2008—long thought to portray Saint Julia—I refused to believe that it is by Bosch. The painting was in such bad shape that, in places, the colors looked smudged and the outlines were sometimes vague. Now restored, the triptych looks like vintage Bosch—and Saint Wilgefortis has her beard back. (You'll have to go to Madrid to find out what that means.)
For me, the personal highlight of the exhibition also comes from Venice: The four paintings collectively known as Visions of the Hereafter. These paintings have long been difficult to see, hidden away as they were in the Doge's Palace. I was crushed when I splurged for the famous Palace Secret Itineraries Tour to see the Bosches—only to discover that all four were off being restored. What a relief it was, finally, to see them in Madrid, and to confirm that they are among Bosch's greatest works, especially the panel known as The Ascent of the Blessed, which uncannily depicts the tunnel of light that people who have had near-death experiences often describe.
In their home institutions, the famous Bosch triptychs are normally displayed almost flat up against walls, thus making it difficult to observe the reverse sides of the wing panels. The Madrid exhibition lets you see these paintings in the round. Indeed, you can walk all around them and admire them from many different angles—up close and from far away. This is particularly important with Bosch. What fascinates viewers in his paintings are the details—all the strange miniature scenes he conjures up in heaven and in hell, and on the earth. The one drawback of the exhibition is the huge crowds it has inevitably attracted; but if you're patient and willing to jostle a bit, within a few minutes you're able to get a front-row seat, as it were, for the great triptychs. In fact, you can get within a few feet of all of them and observe the details as long as you like in a way that is normally impossible in their home settings.
What may be even better is that you can get sightlines that allow you to appreciate the triptychs in a way that also is difficult in their home institutions. The devil may be in the details in Bosch paintings, but seen from the proper distance, they reveal another aspect of his genius: the way the details fit together into larger patterns and form a genuine artistic whole. After all, one can observe the details of Bosch paintings in books; photographic reproduction can offer sections of the works blown up. But especially for the larger triptychs, reproductions in books fail to convey a sense of the big picture. You have to view the paintings in person to be able to see how artfully composed they are—how Bosch balances the colors, creates a rhythm in the figures, and shapes larger patterns out of the minuscule details he so brilliantly portrays.
That is why the Madrid exhibition is a once-in-a-lifetime experience. But as they say on late-night television ads, "Wait! There's more." A ticket to the Bosch exhibition entitles you to see the whole Prado, and it may well be the most impressive art museum in the world. Its collection of Spanish paintings is, of course, unrivaled (including El Greco, Velázquez, and Goya), and because of the Habsburg connections of the Spanish royal family, the Prado excels in its Flemish and Dutch collections as well. And your feet will give out before the Prado's Titians do. Just to be provocative, I will add that, for me, the greatest single painting in the world is Rogier van der Weyden's Descent from the Cross, and it's in the Prado, gorgeously restored.
Just across the street from the Prado is the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum, which in almost any other city would be the artistic highlight. Its collection is strong in the areas where the Prado is weak, including one of the best collections of modern art in Europe and, surprisingly, what may now be the best collection of American paintings outside the United States. And the Thyssen-Bornemisza is currently featuring an exhibition called "Caravaggio and the Painters of the North" (open till September 18). If 24 Bosch paintings are not enough to attract you to Madrid, then how about 10 or 12 Caravaggios? (I fudge again because of attribution issues.) I can't think of a moment when one city has hosted two exhibitions of this quality, both involving great artists whose paintings are rare and hard to track down. (I saw five Caravaggios I hadn't seen before, from exotic places such as Cremona and Kansas City. Incidentally, Kansas City is on a roll this art season: One of the seemingly minor paintings in its Nelson-Atkins Museum just got upgraded to a genuine Bosch and is included in the Madrid exhibition.)
And rounding out the art scene in Madrid is the Reina Sofia Museum, which currently has an exhibition (open until mid-August) of the Cuban surrealist Wifredo Lam, who was influenced by Bosch. Last time I checked, the Reina Sofia also had a painting called Guernica by a Spanish painter whose name escapes me at the moment, but I think he's pretty famous.
Even in normal times, Madrid is one of the premier destinations for world-class paintings, but at the moment, it's the center of the artistic universe.
