Initial T with a group of Benedictine monks singing before an altar from which issues water

1430s

Master of the Cypresses

Associated Names
Master of the Cypresses

Artist, Spanish, active 1434

This is a painting of a religious scene contained within an illuminated letter. Within the twisting blue-and-green letter, the painting showcases a group of monks in brown robes gathered in prayer at an altar with two golden panels. An open book on a yellow stand is visible next to the monks. The altar has a white cloth draped over it, and the wall around the panels is pink. In the front, an old man with a gray beard wearing red and green robes is bent low, his hands extended below a golden spout shaped like an animal head that appears to shoot water into the ground. The scene is surrounded by the large letter, which looks like a lower-case ‘a’ shaped like a dragon-like creature and surrounded by a thick gold outline.

Media Options

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Artwork overview

  • Medium

    miniature on vellum

  • Credit Line

    Rosenwald Collection

  • Dimensions

    overall: 18.6 x 22.4 cm (7 5/16 x 8 13/16 in.)

  • Accession Number

    1964.8.1219

  • Catalogue Raisonné

    NGA Miniatures 1975, no. 46, State B

  • Series Title

    13 Initials from a Choir Book, Antiphonary (1964.8.1218-1230)

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Purchased in Madrid in 1849 by William Stirling-Maxwell [1818 - 1878], London (from an album with his device and bookplate as William Stirling). (Bernard M. Rosenthal, Inc., New York); purchased 1960 by Lessing J. Rosenwald; gift to NGA, 1964.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1972

  • Mediaeval Manuscripts from the Lessing J. Rosenwald Collection, University of Notre Dame, 1972, no. 24, repro.

  • Witte Memorial Museum, San Antonio, TX, 1972.

1975

  • Medieval and Renaissance Miniatures from the National Gallery of Art, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1975, no. 46b, repro.

2009

  • Heaven on Earth: Manuscript Illuminations from the National Gallery of Art, NGA, 2009.

Bibliography

1975

  • National Gallery of Art. Medieval and Renaissance Miniatures from the National Gallery of Art. Washington, 1975: no. 46, B.

1993

  • Anderson, Barbara C. "A Fifteenth-Century Illumination and the Work of Pedro de Toledo." The J. Paul Getty Museum Journal 21 (1993): 21-23.

Wikidata ID

Q64608113

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