Beschreibung:

FOURTEEN MINIATURES from an illuminated BOOK OF HOURS on vellum [Bruges, 1460s].
FOURTEEN MINIATURES from an illuminated BOOK OF HOURS on vellum [Bruges, 1460s]. Each miniature approx. 57 x 36 mm, pasted to a vellum leaf approx. 86 x 65mm (some wear to Annunciation, slight wear to some other scenes). Two card window mounts, ten and four. Provenance : Gift of ALICE M. DIKE , 1927, to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. At some point these miniatures, painted on independent sheets and appropriate for a Book of Hours, were cut out and pasted to blank leaves which were then bound, presumably as part of a Book of Hours. Such minutely crafted volumes were easily carried and in themselves could function like amulets, providing reassurance and protection. The miniatures of the Annunciation, the Visitation, the Nativity, the Annunciation to the Shepherds, the Adoration of the Magi, the Presentation in the Temple, the Massacre of the Innocents and the Flight into Egypt would have illustrated the Office of the Virgin; the Crucifixion, the Hours of the Cross; Pentecost, the Hours of the Holy Ghost; David, the Penitential Psalms; the Raising of Lazarus, the Office of the Dead; the Coronation of the Virgin could have preceded the Mass of the Virgin or the calendar variations of the Office of the Virgin (as Baltimore, Walters Art Gallery, W 197); Christ as Man of Sorrows with the Instruments of the Passion could have prefaced one of the many prayers current on Christ’s suffering. The miniatures follow the influential compositional patterns and conventions for figures and landscape developed by Willem Vrelant (seen also in e.g. W 197, L. Randall, Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts in the Walters Art Gallery, Belgium 1250-1530 , 1997, cat. 250; for Vrelant and his work, B. Bousmanne, Item à Guillaume Wyelant aussi enlumineur , 1997). Vrelant, from Utrecht, had settled in Bruges by 1454 where he rapidly attracted prestigious patrons, headed by the Dukes of Burgundy, Philip the Good and his successor, Charles the Bold, and also worked with assistants to meet the demands of a wider market. The artist of these miniatures is close to Vrelant in style and technique, deploying rich comparatively unmodulated colours, clarified and defined by line, to create attractively detailed scenes even on this small scale.