Refined illumination in grisaille, one of the specialties of Willem Vrelant and his associates, and reminiscent of the painterly realism of Flemish painters.

162 × 110 mm. Single leaf, ruled in red ink for single column of nineteen lines (justification: 98 × 58 mm), unfoliated, written in brown ink in a textualis formata script with looping ascenders at top line, rubrics in red, single text bar of burnished gold on blue and red ground with white tracery decoration, seven illuminated initials of one and two lines in burnished gold on blue and red ground with white tracery infill, ONE HISTORIATED INITIAL of Dove of the Holy Spirit in blue with white filigree on gold ground. Light discoloration in margins, slight cockling of the parchment, tape stains visible on upper margin of verso, else in good condition.
 
This leaf contains the opening of the Hours of the Holy Spirit on the recto (true verso): Domine labia mea aperies, et os meum annuntiabit laudem tuam, with the verso containing the explicit for Compline from the Hours of the Cross. The delicately painted historiated initial forms the incipit ‘D’ for Domine. In style and format, it is similar to other diminutive Books of Hours illuminated in Bruges in the 1460s by artists working in the style of Willem Vrelant, most notably a group held at the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore (e.g., W.177, 179, 180, and 183). The leaf is especially like one offered at Freeman’s Hindman (2024, lot 49). Although it comes from a different parent manuscript, it was possibly produced by the same workshop. The quality of work by artists working in the Vrelant style can vary, but the present initial is particularly refined. The naturalistic rendering of the dove, created with subtle volumetric shading and finished with delicate penwork, is indicative of Vrelant’s adoption of painterly realism from Flemish painters like Jan van Eyck and Rogier van der Weyden.

 
Provenance
(1) Originally from a Book of Hours created most likely in Bruges or vicinity, from stylistic evidence.

(2) Bruce Ferrini, Akron, Ohio, his inventory number VM 3888 on verso.

(3) Private Collection.

LITERATURE
Unpublished; for Vrelant and his school see: Anne Korteweg, “Masters and Miniatures: Observations on the Vrelant Group of Manuscript Illuminators,” in Masters and Miniatures: Proceedings of the Congress on Medieval Manuscript Illumination in the Northern Netherlands, ed. Koert van der Horst, Utrecht, 1984, pp. 109–122; Antoine De Schryver, Willem Vrelant: Un enlumineur du XVe siècle à Bruges, Brussels, 1995. Bernard Bousmanne, “Item à Guillaume Wyelant aussi enlumineur,” Willem Vrelant: Un aspect de l’enluminure dans les Pays-Bas méridionaux sous le mécénat des ducs de Bourgogne Philippe le Bon et Charles le Téméraire, Brussels and Turnhout, 1997; Thomas Kren and Scot McKendrick, eds. Illuminating the Renaissance: The Triumph of Flemish Manuscript Painting in Europe, Los Angeles, 2003.

We thank Senior Consultant Sandra Hindman and Peter Bovenmyer for their assistance in preparing this sale.