The Unspeakable Subject of Hieronymus Bosch - Joseph Leo Koerner

Joseph Leo Koerner
Victor S. Thomas Professor, Department of History of Art and Architecture, Harvard University
January 20, 2009
From the time of its original display through the present day, the subject of Hieronymus Bosch's so-called "Garden of Delights" has eluded audiences. In a lecture devoted to what is arguably the most enigmatic work in the history of art, Joseph Leo Koerner, Victor S. Thomas Professor of Art and Architecture at Harvard University, examines why Bosch's subject was made deliberately unspeakable. The lecture is part of the Art as Knowledge series, which features talks by leading art historians on the subject of how art develops and conveys knowledge. The respondent for the lecture was Christopher Heuer, Assistant Professor of Art and Archaeology at Princeton University and one of the organizers of the Art as Knowledge series.
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[@kw22wombts96]

I think this speech was truly profound and life changing, I had to pause it a lot but man was this a trip around time, matter, morality, archetypes of our feelings, sin, and THE SELF! Ya'll are crazy to think this isn't amazing.

[@TheMonolake]

This might be the most impressive work of art in human history.

[@decruzyserao6994]

Brilliant analysis of Bosch’s most well known work ... Thank you for posting this exceptional lecture

[@mineheadX1]

absolutely mind-blowing ! thx very much for posting this lecture.

[@martintomlinson7039]

I love this painting, and have seen several interesting documentaries which try to explain it. Koerner, however, seems more concerned with presenting himself. The worst kind of literary intellectual, where the importance, to himself, of his words, totally overshadows the subject. Or as he might say, a cornucopia of conceptual onanism, which inters cerebral advancement in the mire of multitudinous metaphors.

[@schoolcraft420]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/mWmllZiHqsqKj8U I see a couple tic tacs and a flying saucer at 51 : 09

[@Garfunkarella]

This was amazing. Thank you.

[@ferrispictures]

Brilliant and very helpful in front of Bacon or Giacometti, etc. Thank you.

[@annascott3542]

Titillating lecture. I love how he goes into explicit detail with precise descriptions of just who’s doing what, how, and to whom in the pornographic vignettes, the center panel.

[@dreed7312]

I appreciate the effort he's made and value his insight. Gives us something new to think about. I disagree with his analysis and conclusions. But I'm about to watch again. I would prefer he didnt talk like he writes. Seems like once he put that much effort into it he wouldn't have to read the lecture but maybe this was his first time presenting it.

[@ruiyanzhu3290]

Craving a transcript

[@joeyselder5693]

I liked this. It just took forever to get through cause I had to keep googling definitions.

[@RaulZamudiocuratorwriter]

tour de force...like all of Koerner's work!!

[@rich1701]

Good to see analysis of the cover piece, it’s too often overlooked

[@michaelpost7352]

5:45 - “I hypothesized that Bosch’s notorious masterpiece was the painting of an enemy, and further that that enemy might be nothing other than Bosch’s painting itself.” Does anyone know what this introductory statement means?

[@schoolcraft420]

36:40 What's that in the top-right corner?

[@lapseevident3132]

Nice

[@gabriellefagan1014]

I have never known about the outer painting......... Until now

[@aristotlechange1424]

The greatest ever artist a true visionary and aware of nans greatest flaw, greed

[@schoolcraft420]

9:30 Please look at the center of the artwork, Obviously an egg, or maybe a tic-tac? There are others.

[@paulkesler1744]

Speaking of etymology, the name "Bosch" is also related to the archaic word "bosk" (meaning forest or thicket) and to the Middle English adjective "bosky" (meaning woody or shady) as well as to the much more obvious "bush."

[@henrynagelberg]

And, to continue belaboring the obvious, Bosch is Middle Dutch spelling of "Bos", meaning "wood". 'sHertogenbosch,= the Duke's Woods, or Den Bosch. Jeroen Bosch's family name was "van Akken" (Aachen), he changed it to indicate where he was from. A very common practice in those days. Cheers.

[@schoolcraft420]

52:40 Maybe these things are giving us the plague?

[@schoolcraft420]

41:00 there's another, very bottom

[@irishtino1595]

The verbal gymnastics plays well for the ivy league audience but it is distracting and quite frankly ridiculum. I tried to watch a BBC documentary he did once and I found his style distracting. The man is highly gifted, but his communication skills take away from his obvious perspicacious knowledge of his subject.

[@stephenboyd6269]

Try this guy, sound is poor but the knowledge isn't. kzbin.info/www/bejne/hX-3fZx_o6mAgKs

[@robothunter1035]

Yeah! It looks great! The fat one balances the two skinny ones.

[@rosemaryallen2128]

Oh my! Oh my! More matter and less art! What insights there were, were well disguised behind the type of academic verbiage so typical and so unnecessary!

[@hb8213]

20

[@geokaker9630]

I think it’s a doomed undertaking for non Christian historians, scholars, etc to undertake fully deconstructing a fundamentally Christian work that isn’t protestant or younger than 100 years

[@khatuncadalozkaya1399]

Think about what you are implying with this statement.

[@Forever-tn7pe]

At least in the postmodern Western context, which exalts the ego as the only valid interpretive matrix. 21st century secular humanists wall their homes not with windows, but mirrors.

[@TheTeacher1020]

I prefer lectures that are more personalized. This sounds like a script.

[@threethrushes]

One of the strangest things I experienced as a graduate student in the humanities (literature), was lectures being read out verbatim. What is the point? Does the presenter really not know the material well-enough that they cannot give a speech? Some notes, or slides are fine, but to listen to a lecture being read is dull and not engaging at all.

[@edwardlobb931]

Rather than portraying humanity's boundless passion and lust, Bosch chose to devote his talent to an obsession over cruelty and shame. His figures are strange little dolls, instructed to perform while frozen. His visage in portraits reveal a sardonic nature, so often associated with Schadenfreude.

[@Ninja.Alinja]

6:50 The era of division ending today 🤣😅🤪 So the messiah didn’t bring world peace in 8 years. What’s the weather like in the ivory tower? So super over educated and so far removed from reality…

[@jfurl5900]

not so much a talk ,,, more a reading , .

[@TheNoblot]

The Qatar land of art Paintings can fix the issue: =) to b or not to B. from H Bosch to Bremont. Eventually imagination can bring peace, bring peace to the land, to the mind and the sea. This money investing associations that always promises a gain subjugates, you; the capital, to a system. A system of reasoning and qualifying. the system has enslaved them as it has enslaved you. They have become wars machines, amongst themselves as they eliminate each other’s, nowhere to be safe, as nowhere to hide, from drones, to electronic tapping’s GMO, and hurricanes! Freedom! from all those problems and freedom to your hart, your mind and your people. As once the Art world becomes free, their rules will gain freedom from the system that is oppressing them & you which they fail to understand the illogical oppressive thoughts of evil derange minds. art as liberty to exist, as and art self, is the energy of the mind, the art becomes alive, and completes the triangle of reality, which are the paintings of Hieronymus bosh is art to exhibit to exist on the kingdom of culture, as culture preserves the world. to be complete I propose the 3 items of my mind, 3 panels of the world. It must be a whole, not just parts of it to be complete.

[@markkennerdale3373]

Do you communicate in English?

[@TheNoblot]

@Barbara Mulvaney what is WTF

[@TheNoblot]

@Barbara Mulvaney could it be waste of time or it could be worth to find😉😘

[@TheNoblot]

@Barbara Mulvaney from 2 years ago to today is it love or confusion 🍾🍾🍯🍦😉😊