The Master of the Assisi Choirbooks (active final quarter 13th century)
ST FRANCIS’ STIGMATISATION and PREACHING TO BIRDS, initial ‘F’ from an antiphonal [Assisi, c. 1280s]
The pinnacle of Umbrian manuscript painting: a supreme example of Gothic elegance in the last decades of the 13th century and a rare and extraordinary testament to the work of the Master of the Assisi Choirbooks.

Perhaps originally from one of the series of choirbooks produced at the end of the 13th century for the Basilica of San Francesco at Assisi – or for another Franciscan house in Umbria – the present miniature is notable for its engaging vitality, the nuanced treatment of the figures and the rich and exuberant decoration of the letter-form. The Master of the Assisi Choirbooks was a follower and contemporary of Cimabue, and there are strong stylistic links between the anonymous artist’s rendering of figures and Cimabue’s representation of St Francis of Assisi (now Assisi, Museo della Porziuncola), which F. Todini describes as ‘the expressive apex of Italian artistic culture’. He operated within the same milieu as the Master of Deruta-Salerno, one of the most important illuminators of the Italian late duecento – and indeed has, in the past, been confused with that same anonymous master, before being isolated as a distinct artist by Todini (Francesco d’Assisi. Documenti e Archivi. Codici e Biblioteche. Miniature, exhibition catalogue, Milan, 1982).

The present cutting belongs with three cuttings in European private collections (a Nativity, a St Michael and a Christ healing the paralytic) and four at the Germanisches Nationalmuseum in Nuremberg (B 32-34), which were identified by Todini (La Pittura Umbra, 1989, I, p. 116) as related to the fragmentary Antiphonal ‘Cantorino n. 2 (Ms. 1)’ in Assisi. Of the four in Germany, the present miniature is closest to the initial ‘F’ with St Francis preaching: we see the same elongated figure of St Francis, the same linear draperies, the same greyish skin tones (see Splendori Di Assisi. Capolavori Dal Museo Della Basilica Di San Francesco, exhibition catalogue, 1998-99, pp. 142-147). The background decoration too is similar, with the same white filigree decoration, but the decoration of the letter-form – the knotted interlace and the crossed roundel in particular – is distinctive.

Provenance:
•MARCEL VON NEMES (1866-1930), Hungarian financier and art collector. No 94 in the catalogue of his sale, Sammlung Marczell de Nemes, Amsterdam, 1928.
•Private collection, London. Purchased from Erasmushaus, Basel, in 1986.

227 x 140mm. Initial ‘F’ presumably opening the Feast of St Francis in an Antiphonal ‘Franciscus ut in publicum [...]’. Mounted.

Please note this lot is the property of a private consignor.

Please note this lot is the property of a consumer. See H1 of the Conditions of Sale.