Belbello da Pavia (Italian, active c. 1430 – c. 1473)
Initial M: The Annunciation to the Virgin, miniature from a choir book (antiphonal) (Lombardy), 1450/1460
tempera and gold leaf on vellum
Rosenwald Collection, 1948
Heaven on Earth: Manuscript Illuminations from the National Gallery of Art
Rare medieval manuscript illuminations, last exhibited in 1975, will be showcased in a stunning installation, Heaven on Earth: Manuscript Illuminations from the National Gallery of Art, on view in the East Building from March 1 through August 2, 2009
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Fifty-two single leaves and four bound volumes, among them a number of important recent acquisitions, date from the 12th to the 16th century and were made in France, Germany, Austria, Bohemia, the Netherlands, Spain, and Italy. Comprehensive wall texts will include new scholarly information, uncovered since the last time these works were exhibited.
“Protected inside closed volumes on library shelves for centuries, many of the images are today as breathtakingly vibrant and beautiful as they were centuries ago,” said Earl A. Powell III, director, National Gallery of Art.
Prior to the invention of the printing press in the 15th century, texts were laboriously inscribed by hand on carefully prepared parchment made from the skin of sheep or calves. Artists adorned the most luxurious books with painted decorations, known as “illuminations” because the frequent use of gold leaf made the pages glow. GIven the time, effort, and materials required for their production, illuminated manuscripts were extremely precious works of art treasured by their owners.
The majority of the works in the exhibition depict a range of sacred subjects, as the books most commonly illuminated throughout the Middle Ages were bibles and liturgical texts used in church services and in the daily cycle of prayers offered by communities of monks and nuns. In the late Middle Ages the most popular illuminated books were private devotional texts, called “books of hours,” prepared for well-to-do patrons. Secular texts were also illustrated and are represented in the exhibition by manuscripts treating canon law, ancient history, and civic statutes, as seen here in The Meeting of Achilles and Hector, from Histoire Ancienne Jusqu’ à César (c. 1450).
Most of the miniatures in this exhibition are single leaves or cuttings that have been removed from manuscripts. In the 19th century collectors often cut illustrated pages or illuminated initials out of manuscripts to frame them as independent works of art. That practice is now condemned. Once outside the protection of their books, illuminations are increasingly subject to damage and loss, and their original contexts become difficult to trace.
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