New Perspectives on Flemish Illumination

The Proceedings of the Colloquium New Perspectives on Flemish
Illuminations constitute an overview of recent research into
manuscript illumination in Flanders under the Dukes of Burgundy.





In 1959 Leon Delaisse organized the seminal exhibition La
miniature flamande. Le mecenat de Philippe le Bon (Flemish
Illumination. The Patronage of Philip the Good). Seen in Brussels,
Amsterdam and Paris, it was a ground-breaking initiative. In 2018,
alomst sixty years later, our knowledge of the illuminated manuscript in
the Southern Netherlands during the Burgundian period has vastly
increased, as revealed in the exhibition Miniatures flamandes
1404-1482 (Flemish Miniatures 1404-1482) held in Brussels and Paris
in 2011-2012. The associated Colloquium stimulated fifteen papers, by
leading specialists in the field, presented here in five sections. The
first concentrates on individual illuminators: Jan de Tavernier, the
Master of the Houghton Miniatures, the Painters of Philip the Good's
Alexander and Loyset Liedet; the second considers text, traditions and
images; the third, on the relationships between illumination and panel
painting, is followed by codicological studies developing the topics of
artistic interchange, border decoration and portraits in musical
manuscripts. The final section consists of technical studies of
grisaille illuminations and methods of flesh painting.





Through new research techniques and topics, together with established
approaches such as connoisseurship and codicology, the papers advance
our understanding of the intentions, processes, chronology and
geographic distribution of Flemish manuscript production.