Blondé/Vlieghe 1990
“De sociale achtergrond van Jheronimus Bosch” (B. Blondé and H. Vlieghe) 1990
[in: Bijdragen tot de Geschiedenis, vol. 73 (1990), nr. 1-2, pp. 19-26]
The taxes that Bosch had to pay in 1502/03 and 1512/13 and the tax on the rent value of his house in 1505/06 show that this painter belonged to the social top layer of ’s-Hertogenbosch in the beginning of the sixteenth century. This small elite possessed the majority of earthly wealth in the city which led to a clear situation of social inequality which in turn formed the basis for an elitarian ‘bourgeois culture’.
In a footnote the authors raise the question whether this elite (to which Bosch clearly belonged) also believed in the ‘middle-class values and standards’ to which Bosch, according to Paul Vandenbroeck (1987a), gave shape in his paintings.
[explicit]
