Painting and illumination in early Renaissance Florence: the techniques of Lorenzo Monaco and his workshop

• Autores: Paola Ricciardi, Michelle Facini, John K. Delaney
• Localización: The Renaissance Workshop / David Saunders (ed. lit.), Marika Spring (ed. lit.), Andrew Meek (ed. lit.), 2013, ISBN 978-1-904982-93-7, págs. 1-9
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • Lorenzo Monaco is known as one of the greatest panel painters and manuscript illuminators of the early Florentine Renaissance. At the end of the fourteenth century, his workshop was almost entirely responsible for the illumination of liturgical and choir books for the Camaldolese monks of Santa Maria degli Angeli. An extensive "in situ" analytical survey of the illuminations was performed to identify the artist's materials and painting technique. Overall, the range of pigments and mixtures used in each of the books was found to be uniform, regardless of the attribution of single pages to different artists, and also quite homogeneus across the entire range of volumes analysed. Evidence for a compositionally selective use of egg (yolk) tempera was detected in the choir books using near infrared imaging spectroscopy. As a panel painter, Lorenzo Monaco was familiar with egg tempera, which has seldom been identified on manuscript illuminations. Art historians have long commented on the significant similarity in the style and technique observed in Monaco's panel painting and parchment illuminations. This analytical study supports such observations by providing relational technical data linking panel painting and illumination in Monaco's workshop, where both arts were practised. Furthemore, an analytical survey of other illuminations produced in Italy between 1350 and 1500 determined that the use of egg tempera for manuscript illumination is quite unique to the scriptorium at Santa Maria degli Angeli, where Monaco was trained and to the artist's circle in particular. The result can be used together with existing informatin on materials and style to help with attribution and dating for manuscript leaves.