[ENLUMINATION]. Funeral scene (Scène... - Lot 4 - Ader

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  3. [ENLUMINATION]. Funeral scene (Scène... - Lot 4 - Ader
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[ENLUMINATION]. Funeral scene (Scène... - Lot 4 - Ader
[ENLUMINATION]. Funeral scene (Scène funèbre). Leaf from a book of hours, Office of the Dead. In Latin, illuminated leaf handwritten on parchment. Ink and gouache, good general condition, some rubbing, parchment stained from an old gluing, without affecting the miniature or the illuminated borders. Belgium, probably Ghent (or Antwerp?), circa 1460-1470, attributable to Liévin van Lathem (active Ghent and Antwerp, 1454-1493) or a disciple of Liévin van Lathem (?) . Provenance : Estate of Pierre Hautot (France). Dimensions : 175 x 120 mmThe funeral, like any rite, is an event suspended in time: the present miniature gives this impression of universal timelessness . The "mourners" represented in this miniature evoke with restraint the common fate of humanity, going beyond the individual to invest the universal. This leaf is taken from a book of hours produced in Flanders, and the miniature introduces an important section in the manuscript, namely the Office of the Dead. The curved miniature depicts a funeral procession scene, with the coffin covered with a red burial cloth (or pan) with gold highlights, accompanied by hooded mourners dressed in black and brown. The excavated grave is open, ready to receive the coffin. The mourners are reminiscent of the alabaster mourners carved for the tombs of the Dukes of Burgundy. A priest, a tonsured monk, holds an open book and pronounces funeral prayers, assisted by two young clerics, one of whom holds a seal of holy water. The scene takes place under an architecture composed of skilfully figured gray colonnades. These columns and arches with hanging keystones form a sort of gallery or portico open to the outside and the mourners accompanying the coffin are for some hidden behind a column, giving an impression of movement to the scene or a snapshot of the scene captured by the illuminator. In the distance, an architecture (church or chapel?) on a mound and a figure heading there (pilgrim?). The particular treatment of this miniature is noteworthy, with the procession captured in its progress between the gallery-portico and the exterior, showing mourners in profile or from behind, with faces sometimes perceptible under the hoods. The figures of the mourners are reminiscent of those found, for example, in a miniature at the beginning of the Office of the Dead (Sam Fogg, Book of Hours, painted by the Wodhull-Harberton Master and the Houghton Master, c. 1490). A related burial scene with mourners, in a miniature attributed to Liévin van Lathem, is found in the so-called Trivulzio Hours (The Hague, KB, SMC 1, fol. 30v), with very similar figures, architectures (but more elaborate) and border elements (note the following small detail: the same double fillet in pale red ink in the outer frame of the illuminated border) [see T. Kren, "Trivulzio Hours" in Illuminating the Renaissance, Los Angeles, 2003, pp. 132-134]. In the absence of more liturgical information, we cannot say for what precise purpose this book of hours was made. On the back are 17 lines of text that continue the beginning of the Office of the Dead, punctuated by small watermarked initials painted in blue or burnished gold with red or dark blue watermarked decoration. The text is copied in brown ink in a bastard Burgundian script typical of Flemish manuscripts of the period. The curved miniature is set in an illuminated frame composed of foliage, colored acanthus leaves, flowers and fruit, with a bird with outstretched wings and a zoomorphic figure on a reserved background delimited by two fillets drawn in pale red ink. Ornate baguettes alternating geometric motifs painted in pink and blue with white and burnished gold highlights frame the miniature. The text on the front of the leaf begins "Dilexi quoniam exaudiet dominus..." (Psalm 114), introduced by a large ornate initial D painted in blue on a burnished gold background set with colored grape leaves. The miniature is attributable to Liévin van Lathem or his entourage, a painter and illuminator active in Ghent and Antwerp in the second half of the 15th century in Flanders. He was the painter of Duke Philip the Good of Burgundy for whom he produced several manuscripts, including the prayer book produced for Duke Philip in collaboration with Dreux Jehan and Simon Marmion, Paris, BnF, NAF 16428. Later, he worked for his son Charles the Bold, although he does not appear in the duke's accounts, notably for the realization of a prayer book now preserved at the Getty Museum (Los Angeles, Getty Museum, MS 37; see Kren and McKendrick, Illuminating the Renaissance, no. 16, pp. 128-31), the first phase of which was paid for in 1469.
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