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Details
ISAIAH, historiated initial P on a cutting from a Gradual, ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPT ON VELLUM
[Lombardy, c.1505]
168 x 173 overall. This initial opened the introit,'Populos Sion...', for Mass on the second Sunday in Advent, remnants of text visible on the reverse are from the offertory and hymn for the first Sunday in Advent (slight craquelure of gold, retouching to small losses from blue background). Framed. Provenance: Lord Northwick, his sale Sotheby's London 16 November 1925, lot 151; Robert Lehman, New York, exhibited, Treasures of a Lost Art, Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY, 2003, no 70, exh. cat. P. Palladino.
This is one of a group of cuttings, now dispersed through collections in the US and Europe, that have been traced to a series of choirbooks made for the Olivetan monastery of SS Angelo e Niccolò at Villanova Sillaro near Lodi in Lombardy. Consistently handsome and impressive works, their illuminator has been named the Master B.F. from the monogram on other initials by his hand.
Although a large body of work has been attributed to him, most of it for Olivetan monasteries or for members of the Milanese court and datable to the first decades of the 16th century, no suggestions for his identity or artistic formation are universally accepted: C. Quattrini in Dizionario Biografico degli miniatori italiani, ed. M. Bollati, 2004, pp.438-42.
The debt to the de' Predis workshop and Giovan Pietro Birago seem evident in the crisp linearity and intense colour of his style, while the impact of Leonardo's presence in Milan had an enduring influence upon his compositions and figure types. It was no doubt these features combined with invention, technical mastery and elegance that led to Master B.F.'s position in Milan as the most sought-after illuminator of his generation.
[Lombardy, c.1505]
168 x 173 overall. This initial opened the introit,'Populos Sion...', for Mass on the second Sunday in Advent, remnants of text visible on the reverse are from the offertory and hymn for the first Sunday in Advent (slight craquelure of gold, retouching to small losses from blue background). Framed. Provenance: Lord Northwick, his sale Sotheby's London 16 November 1925, lot 151; Robert Lehman, New York, exhibited, Treasures of a Lost Art, Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY, 2003, no 70, exh. cat. P. Palladino.
This is one of a group of cuttings, now dispersed through collections in the US and Europe, that have been traced to a series of choirbooks made for the Olivetan monastery of SS Angelo e Niccolò at Villanova Sillaro near Lodi in Lombardy. Consistently handsome and impressive works, their illuminator has been named the Master B.F. from the monogram on other initials by his hand.
Although a large body of work has been attributed to him, most of it for Olivetan monasteries or for members of the Milanese court and datable to the first decades of the 16th century, no suggestions for his identity or artistic formation are universally accepted: C. Quattrini in Dizionario Biografico degli miniatori italiani, ed. M. Bollati, 2004, pp.438-42.
The debt to the de' Predis workshop and Giovan Pietro Birago seem evident in the crisp linearity and intense colour of his style, while the impact of Leonardo's presence in Milan had an enduring influence upon his compositions and figure types. It was no doubt these features combined with invention, technical mastery and elegance that led to Master B.F.'s position in Milan as the most sought-after illuminator of his generation.
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Eugenio Donadoni
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