It is possible that on some occasion you have encountered some of these works.Canvases whose main theme is madness, and the way in which their healing is carried out.Or at least it is tried.If we speak precisely of the reasonless, of the imbalance and of the counterposition between that world of sinrazon and calm, we find without a doubt one of its greatest artistic exponents: El Bosco.
Absolute specialist in capturing each of the sins of mankind, in his painting entitled "The extraction of the stone of madness", shows us one of the most curious subjects and interesting from the art world.
In it, we are taught the allegory of a common practice that was in the Middle Ages to solve the madness: pulling it out.
El Bosco, subtle photographer of the human sinrazon
Jheronimus Bosch , better known as El Bosco has always been a wise craftsman of the emotions and sins of humanity.Only the Saints, immersed in their calm and introspective dimension, are our absolute model of salvation.Although that yes, they also sometimes have around them, to evil presences that can tempt them.
Our sins, as mere mortals almost always ignorant, are our vices and that energetic pride that makes us believe that we know everything.That we can even challenge nature itself. "The extraction of the stone of madness" , is an example of it.The main theme of it is simple.According to the Flemish painter, in the Middle Ages there was the conviction that madness It had its origin in a stone that every unbalanced person had in their head.
So how to heal it? How to return that needy reason with which to integrate it back into society? Practicing a wild intervention in which, look for the supposed stone .We have only a few minutes to attend the illustrative picture of Bosco to discover some interesting nuances:
- We see a strange doctor with a funnel on his head, a symbol of human stupidity.
- The supposedly unbalanced person is an older man who looks at us as if crying for help.A stone is not extracted, but a tulip.
- Do you see the money bag on the table? It is crossed with a stanchion, absolute symbol of the malevola scam of this operation.
- Also present in the work a nun and a friar. The first brings a closed book in the head, which makes us intuit that subtle metaphor so well expressed by Bosco, towards ignorance and that superstition that, instead of saving souls, it kills people.But, eye, there are those who see That book is not a sacred work, but a manual of spells.And what does the friar bring into his hands? Nothing more and nothing less than a good wine singer.
- Also note that if you look, the box itself is arranged in a circular form, which makes us remember to a kind of mirror.Reflecting our own ignorance ? Surely, as we can see, the ingenuity of the Dutch painter had no limits.
The stone of madness, a recurring theme
El Bosco was not the only one artist who wanted to capture this terrible practice.In the image that serves as the head of this article, we find another similar work entitled «The Surgeon» by Jan Sanders van Hemessen, a Flemish painter of the Nordic Renaissance, Really interesting too.
To tell the truth, the theme of the stone of madness was a fairly common theme in vintage painting, apparently the need to denounce a classic custom of the Middle Ages was sought that even reached the Renaissance.Where to symbolize through pictorial allegories, trying to find that "cranial calculus" -simil of the calcu the kidneys-, which hindered reason and brought madness.
To conclude, we must clarify something important that tell us historians : At no time is it known that operations were carried out in the Middle Ages to remove these "stones."
The issue of cranial calculi is a simple "allegory." real.It is a pictorial symbol that actually served many artists such as Bosco, to capture human stupidity at its best, while criticizing a practice that had been done since ancient times : the trepanation.
If you were interested in this article, you also know the case of 3 people who were lobotomized.
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