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Balaam and the Ass
by Hans Bol
About the Artwork
While this small miniature, made with watercolor on parchment, depicts a scene from the Old Testament in the left foreground, its primary subject is the expansive rural scene, landscape, and distant hillside city beyond. Hans Bol combined realistic city views, based on his onsite observation, with imaginary scenes and narratives, appealing to his late-16th-century urban Netherlandish audience. The story of the Balaam and the Ass was associated with greed in the period. The miniature was likely paired with other scenes highlighting contemporary moral issues to be displayed together in a domestic setting.
Inscriptions
Signed and dated in gold, on the trunk of the central tree: HBol 1583; bears old numbering on the panel verso: No 28; old inventory number on a label, verso: 268
Exhibition history
Tales of the City: Drawing in the Netherlands from Bosch to Bruegel. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (co-organizer) (October 9, 2022-January 8, 2023).
Quick Overview
- Artist
- Hans Bol (Flemish, 1534–1593)
- Date
- 1583
- Medium
- Gouache heightened with gold on vellum laid down on panel
- Dimensions
- Sheet: 13.7 x 19.6 cm (5 3/8 x 7 11/16 in.)
- Type
- Drawing
- Classification
- Drawing
- Department
- Drawings
- Credit line
- John L. Severance Fund
- Accession no.
- 2022.3
Provenance
Private Collection, Belgium ?-2022: (Sotheby's, New York, NY), sold to The Cleveland Museum of Art March 7, 2022-: The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
More by Hans Bol in museum collections
Data retrieved from the Cleveland Museum of Art on October 8, 2026. The museum may have updated its record since.
Open-access museum record · AT-00010997
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