ENLUMINATION. ANTIPHONARY. Initial A historiated. Visitation Illuminated... Lot 29

[ENLUMINATION]. [ANTIPHONARY]. Initial A historiated. Visitation Illuminated border: ganto-brugesque decoration with illusionist flowers and fruits on a golden background. Leaf from an antiphonary. Recto and verso : Beginning of the first vespers of the Visitation. Music with square notation on staves with 4 lines. Tempera, gouache and liquid gold on parchment. Belgium, Ghent or Bruges, around 1500-1510. Size of the leaf : 340 x 485 mm ; size of the historiated initial : 73 x80 mm Vertical folding of the leaf but good condition. Comes from an antiphonary painted in Bruges and whose historiated initials and borders recall the art of the so-called Raphael de Mercatellis Masters. These artists formed a collective of anonymous miniaturists active around 1470-1510, probably in different workshops in Ghent and Bruges. They are named after their most notable patron Raphael de Mercatellis (1437-1508), the illegitimate son of Philip the Good of Burgundy who served as abbot of St. Bavo in Ghent and became the most important humanist bibliophile in the Netherlands. The workshop also executed famous commissions for many other illustrious clients such as the Missal of Jan van Broedere (died 1526), abbot and humanist scholar of Grammont Abbey (Geraardsbergen). Bibliography : As-Vijvers, A.-M., Re-Making the Margin..., Turnhout, 2013. - Derolez, A. The Library of Raphael de Mercatellis, Ghent, 1979. - Dogaer, G. Flemish miniature painting in the 15th and 16th centuries, Amsterdam, 1987, pp. 151-155. - Wijsman, H. Luxury Bound: Illustrated Manuscript Production and Noble and Princely Book Ownership in the Burgaudain Netherlands (1400-1550), Turnhout, 2010, pp. 282-283. - Vanwijnsberghe, D. " The Oosteeklo Antiphonary and its illuminator (Cornelia van Wulfschkercke?)," in CeROArt, June 2015.