Details
CAPORALI, BARTOLOMEO, artist. The Coronation of the Virgin. Historiated initial D cut from an ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPT ON VELLUM. [Perugia, c. 1470].
240 x 256 mm. (9 1/2 x 10 1/8 in.); miniature in colors and burnished and liquid gold depicting God the Father, clothed in red and green and wearing a purple tiara, crowning the Virgin, who kneels before him, clad in a blue cloak, both within a mandorla of golden rays against a red and gold background, surrounded by cherubim with life-like faces and variously colored wings, above a landscape; the whole within an enormous and elaborate initial D in mauve with white tracery and leafy ornament in green, blue, red and orange, within a square frame of green laurel leaves, on a burnished gold ground, the corner spaces infilled with foliate arabesques and fantastic buds and fruits; verso blank except for ownership mark. Some cracking and flaking of gold, some rubbing of colors, portions of the lower sky and distant landscape repainted, the color retouched at several spots in the ornamental foliage; extended by the addition of a strip of vellum (5 mm. wide) at the right margin outside the miniature.
Bartolomeo Caporali (c. 1420-1505) was elected chamberlain of the guild of miniaturists in Perugia in 1478, as the successor to his brother Jacopo (Giapeco) who had died. A painter as well as an illuminator, Bartolomeo executed a considerable number of commissions for institutions in Perugia, many of which survive in that city. In 1469 he cooperated with his brother on the illumination of a Missal, later in the Gerli Collection in Milan, and he is credited with miniatures of each of the gates of Perugia, dated 1486. One of these, now in the Academy in Vienna, includes a representation of the Virgin and Child in a mandorla above a landscape, where the general composition and in particular the mandorla resemble those of this Coronation. The colored mandorla with golden rays and the seraphim with naturalistic faces and parti-colored wings appear in many of Caporali's works. The landscape of the present miniature is echoed in the background of a miniature of the Flagellation of Christ in a large initial D very similar to this one that was offered at Christie's London, on 28 June 1995, lot 5. The two initials appear to have come from the same manuscript choirbook or missal, a book that must have remained unfinished, since the verso of the present miniature is blank.
PROVENANCE
Carlo Prayer (1826-1900), stamp [Lugt 1.2044] on recto -- Maria Shira Lelia Mendez (?) de Bernasconi, signature in blue ink on verso, dated 1977 (sale, Christie's London, 24 June 1987, lot 232, to Sam Fogg).
240 x 256 mm. (9 1/2 x 10 1/8 in.); miniature in colors and burnished and liquid gold depicting God the Father, clothed in red and green and wearing a purple tiara, crowning the Virgin, who kneels before him, clad in a blue cloak, both within a mandorla of golden rays against a red and gold background, surrounded by cherubim with life-like faces and variously colored wings, above a landscape; the whole within an enormous and elaborate initial D in mauve with white tracery and leafy ornament in green, blue, red and orange, within a square frame of green laurel leaves, on a burnished gold ground, the corner spaces infilled with foliate arabesques and fantastic buds and fruits; verso blank except for ownership mark. Some cracking and flaking of gold, some rubbing of colors, portions of the lower sky and distant landscape repainted, the color retouched at several spots in the ornamental foliage; extended by the addition of a strip of vellum (5 mm. wide) at the right margin outside the miniature.
Bartolomeo Caporali (c. 1420-1505) was elected chamberlain of the guild of miniaturists in Perugia in 1478, as the successor to his brother Jacopo (Giapeco) who had died. A painter as well as an illuminator, Bartolomeo executed a considerable number of commissions for institutions in Perugia, many of which survive in that city. In 1469 he cooperated with his brother on the illumination of a Missal, later in the Gerli Collection in Milan, and he is credited with miniatures of each of the gates of Perugia, dated 1486. One of these, now in the Academy in Vienna, includes a representation of the Virgin and Child in a mandorla above a landscape, where the general composition and in particular the mandorla resemble those of this Coronation. The colored mandorla with golden rays and the seraphim with naturalistic faces and parti-colored wings appear in many of Caporali's works. The landscape of the present miniature is echoed in the background of a miniature of the Flagellation of Christ in a large initial D very similar to this one that was offered at Christie's London, on 28 June 1995, lot 5. The two initials appear to have come from the same manuscript choirbook or missal, a book that must have remained unfinished, since the verso of the present miniature is blank.
PROVENANCE
Carlo Prayer (1826-1900), stamp [Lugt 1.2044] on recto -- Maria Shira Lelia Mendez (?) de Bernasconi, signature in blue ink on verso, dated 1977 (sale, Christie's London, 24 June 1987, lot 232, to Sam Fogg).