Lot 15

Saint Dominic, historiated initial from an illuminated Gradual, manuscript on vellum [north east Italy (Verona), c.1500]

Estimate

8,000 - 12,000 GBP

bidding is closed

Description

Vellum

a cutting, 520mm. by 189mm., enclosing a large rectangular initial 'I', 176mm. by 144mm., formed of a pink urn sprouting acanthus-leaves and a human face, enclosing the saint with a golden star on his forehead (a reference to his grandmother seeing a star above his head when baptised), holding a book and a lily, and standing full-length in a hilly landscape with a medieval castle or monastery atop a rocky outcrop, all on burnished gold ground, gold bezants and scrolling foliage in border, remains of 2 lines of text with music on a four-line stave on verso, some damage to gold ground in places, and smudge to face at base of initial, else excellent condition, in a card mount

Provenance

Provenance: Denys Sutton (1917-1991); his sale, Christie's, 4 June 2008, lot 35.

Literature

Exhibited, Nasher Museum, Sacred Beauty, 2009, fig.4.

Catalogue Note

Probably from the gradual "Iustus ut palma ..." sung at Mass on the feast of Saint Dominic, 4 August. This beautiful and sensitively executed portrait of the great saint, with its scene lit from the upper-left corner and rectangular frame set in a gold ground, has been identified as the work of the Veronese artist, Girolamo dai Libri (c.1474/5-1555), who was born into a family of illuminators, and according to Vasari, excelled at a very early age. With his father, he dominated the illumination of manuscripts and books in Verona from the 1490s to the early sixteenth century. Their surname means 'of the books', for clearly they excelled in making manuscripts.

This miniature is a notably detailed and well-accomplished composition, which shares much with some of the artist's panel paintings (see in particular that discussed by Castiglione in Verona Illustrata, 2007, pp.39-53).