NEW HAVEN, CONN.- The artist Hieronymus Bosch (c. 1450–1516) lived and worked in ‘s-Hertogenbosch, the Netherlands, where he created enigmatic paintings and drawings full of bizarre creatures, phantasmagoric monsters, and terrifying nightmares. He also depicted detailed landscapes and found inspiration in fundamental moral concepts: seduction, sin, and judgment

As the New York Times reported in a pair of articles in February, the Bosch Research and Conservation Project “spent six years analyzing and documenting every known and possible Bosch work” with results that have revised our understanding of which works were truly created by this brilliantly original artist—and which were not. The revelations have made headline news, some of it controversial, around the world.

What the Guardian has called “one of the most important exhibitions of our century”—the Het Noordbrabants Museum’s stunning and unprecedented Bosch retrospective, in the artist’s native city in the Netherlands, timed to accompany the 500th anniversary of his death—sold out all 380,000 of its tickets weeks ahead of the closing date. It was this show for which the extensive research and documentation was initially undertaken.

The exhibition’s remarkable newsworthiness prompted repeated coverage in the New York Times, where Daniel McDermon observed, “Bosch depicts human depravity and divine punishment with a perverse, if not gleeful, imagination.” Tom Rachman, also writing in the New York Times, noted that “the diabolical visions of Bosch remain beguiling and more popular than ever.” The Economist observed that “there is a sense of urgency to [Bosch’s] paintings that demands attention, and which feels distinctly new.” (The exhibition closes May 8, and another major Bosch exhibition will open at the Prado on May 31.)

Now, Yale University Press publishes three essential books in association with the groundbreaking exhibition seen at the Het Noordbrabants Museum, books that showcase the genius of Hieronymus Bosch, document his full achievement as an artist in greater detail than ever before, and make available the painstaking scholarship around it. They arrive in the midst of the continuing, worldwide fascination with the questions raised by his body of work.

Hieronymus Bosch: Visions of Genius, the first of the three, officially published on April 19, is an accessible survey. This beautiful book, in addition to featuring important new research on his 25 known paintings and 20 drawings, covers the entirety of the artist’s career. It discusses in detail Bosch’s Pilgrimage of Life, Bosch and the Life of Christ, his role as a draughtsman, his depictions of saints, and his visualization of Judgment Day and the hereafter, among other topics, all handsomely illustrated.

It will be followed in June by a magisterial catalogue raisonné—the definitive new catalogue of all of Bosch’s extant paintings and drawings, with all new photography, as well as up-to-date research on the individual works—and a major volume of technical studies.

Hieronymus Bosch, Painter and Draughtsman: Catalogue Raisonné, compiled by members of the Bosch Research and Conservation Project, redefines the artist’s mastery and genius, based on six years of research on the iconography, techniques, pedigree, and conservation history of his paintings and on his life. In this stunning volume, for the first time, the incredible creativity of this late medieval artist, expressed in countless details, is reproduced and discussed. Special attention is paid to Bosch as an image maker, a skilled draughtsman, and a brutal painter, changing the nature of painting around 1500 through his innovative way of working.

Scholars have traditionally focused on the subjects and meanings of Hieronymus Bosch’s works, whereas issues of painting technique, workshop participation, and condition of extant pictures have received considerably less attention. Hieronymus Bosch, Painter and Draughtsman: Technical Studies addresses these long-neglected issues in depth, using state-of-the-art tools. Since 2010, the Bosch Research and Conservation Project has been studying these works using modern methods. The team has documented Bosch’s extant paintings with infrared reflectography and ultra high-resolution digital macro photography, both in infrared and visible light. Together with microscopic study of the paintings, this has enabled the team to write extensive and critical research reports describing the techniques and condition of the works, published in this extraordinary volume for the first time.