The temptation of Saint Antony

Pseudo Jan Wellens de Cock is the conventional name given to an anonymous painter who worked in a style closely related to Jan Wellens de Cock, the Antwerp painter associated with Boschian subject matter. This Temptation of Saint Anthony, dated around 1525 and held in the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, participates in the tradition of Boschian fantasy that de Cock helped perpetuate after Bosch's death in 1516. This work demonstrates how Bosch's influence sustained a recognizable tradition in Antwerp painting through the 1520s. The demonic pageant surrounding the desert father Anthony offered these painters maximum creative latitude for fantastic invention within a devotional frame.

The Pseudo de Cock style imports the full Boschian vocabulary of hybrid monsters, burning landscapes, and grotesque crowd scenes surrounding the isolated, praying saint. The palette combines lurid warm tones for fire with cooler greens and blues for the fantastical creatures.