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Illuminated manuscript of the first five books of the Old Testament (now incomplete), dating from the late 6th or early 7th century (Paris, Bib.N., MS. nouv. acq. lat. 2334) and named after the English collector Bertram Ashburnham. Also known as the Pentateuch of Tours, the Ashburnham Pentateuch is one of the oldest surviving pre-Carolingian Vulgate manuscripts of the Old Testament. In its present condition, it lacks the last verses of Numbers and all of Deuteronomy; while 18 pages of illustration and 1 frontispiece survive from the original 65 pages with illustrations. The illustrated pages comprise several scenes generally arranged in two or three bands, although some pages have one or two large scenes, others combine illustration and text. Painted tituli that follow the Vulgate accompany the miniatures; however, beneath the painted titutli are preliminary inscriptions penned in ink that follow the Vetus latina text.

Based upon stylistic, iconographical and codicological evidence, the Pentateuch appears to have been made in a late 6th- to early 7th-century Italian scriptorium. Twelve pages were added in the 8th century by scribes from Fleury; an additional restored page (fol. 33) was added in the 7th century by a Touronian scribe. The illustrations often deviate from the exact retelling of the biblical text. The column of smoke and fire, for example, in the story of the Crossing of the Red Sea is depicted as a large candle held in two hands, a reference to Easter Vigil liturgical ceremonies (fol. 68...

(b Moscow, May 7, 1903; d Paris, Jan 25, 1988).

Lithuanian art historian, scholar of folklore and Egyptology, and diplomat of Russian birth. Son of the celebrated Lithuanian Symbolist poet of the same name, Jurgis Baltrušaitis II studied under Henri(-Joseph) Focillon at the Sorbonne and earned the PhD in 1931. The concerns of his mentor are evident in La stylistique ornementale dans la sculpture romane (1931), which reprises and extends arguments for the ‘law of the frame’ in Romanesque sculpture. Accordingly, the shapes of architectural members, such as capitals and tympana, determined the articulation of sculptural forms. This theory could account for the genesis of a wide array of monumental carvings, from foliate capitals to narrative reliefs, but ultimately it had a rather limited impact on the field of Romanesque sculptural studies. In a scathing critique, Schapiro argued that Baltrušaitis’s book—and by implication Focillon’s methods—robbed Romanesque sculptors of agency and neglected the religious and expressive meanings of this art form....

British, 18th – 19th century, male.

Born 28 November 1757, in London, United Kingdom; died 12 August 1827, in London.

Painter, draughtsman, engraver, illustrator, poet. Religious subjects, figure compositions.

William Blake was the son of a draper. He showed a strong artistic tendency from an early age and, at the age of 10, started to study drawing at Henry Par’s Academy in the Strand. He learnt engraving under Ryland and was then apprenticed to James Basire. During his seven years with Basire (1772–1779), Blake was made to copy the sculptures of Westminster Abbey and of London’s old churches, thus stimulating his fascination with Gothic art. He studied briefly at the Royal Academy in 1779, where he made friends with Barry, Fuseli, Mortimer, Flaxman, and Stodhart. While there, his studies concentrated on Michelangelo....

[CESCM]

French organization founded in Poitiers in 1953. The Centre d’études supérieures de civilisation médiévale (CECSM) is affiliated with the Université de Poitiers, the Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS), and the Ministère de la Culture et de la Communication. The founders, among them historian Edmond-René Labande and art historian René Crozet, began CESCM as a month-long interdisciplinary study of medieval civilization, inviting foreign students to participate. CESCM has since developed into a permanent organization but maintains the international and interdisciplinary focus of its founders.

CESCM continues to hold its formative summer session, known as ‘Les Semaines d’études médiévales’, and invites advanced graduate students of all nationalities. The summer session spans two weeks and includes sessions on a variety of topics, each conducted by a member or affiliate of CESCM. CESCM supports collaborative research groups and regularly holds colloquia attended by the international scholarly community.

Since 1958 CECSM has published ...

[ho Ch’usa, among others]

(b Yesan, Ch’ungch’ŏng Province, 1786; d Kwach’on, Kyŏnggi Province, 1856).

Korean calligrapher, painter, scholar and poet. He was also a lay Buddhist. Born into a family related by marriage to the imperial household, from an early age he showed his talent for calligraphy, studying with Pak Che-ga. Kim had an extremely successful civil service career before being exiled in 1840 and again in 1848.

In 1809 he accompanied his father on a mission to China and went to Beijing, where he met such eminent scholars as Wen Fanggang (1733–1818) and Ruan Yuan. The scholarship of the Qing period (1644–1911), in particular the northern stele school of calligraphy (see China: Calligraphy), which chose as its calligraphic models the stelae of the Han (206 bc–ad 220) and Northern Wei (ad 386–534) dynasties, made a deep impression on Kim. His own style of calligraphy was characterized by vigorous strokes with a strong contrast between thick and thin lines. This style, known as the Ch’usa (i.e. Kim Chŏng-hŭi) style, was highly influential in Korea and well respected in China (...

Richly illuminated manuscript of the Passover liturgy together with a series of liturgical poems to be read during the Passover week (London, BL, Add. MS. 27210), possibly made in Barcelona, c. 1320. This text was to be recited during the seder ceremony at the eve of the Passover holiday. Like most medieval Haggadot (see Haggadah), the Golden Haggadah has no colophon, and its scribe and patrons are unknown. It contains both marginal decorations and a series of full-page miniatures preceding the text and displaying a fully fledged cycle of biblical illustrations following the books of Genesis and Exodus from the Creation of Man to the Crossing of the Red Sea. Stylistically both types of decoration are indebted to early 14th-century Catalan Gothic art.

Similarly, the imagery of the biblical picture cycle also draws on Christian Old Testament iconography and reflects a familiarity with Christian art. The artists and patrons of the Golden Haggadah adopted Christian pictorial sources in a complex process of adaptation and modification, translating the Christian models into a Jewish visual language meaningful in its messages to the Jewish readership. Avoiding themes and iconographic features of a particular Christological concern, the imagery also reflects a close affinity with the traditions of late antique Bible interpretation (Midrash). This points to a specific circle of scholars active in Iberia during the 13th and early 14th centuries as being responsible for the imagery of the cycle. The use of traditional midrashic Bible exegesis is typical for Sephardic Rabbis of anti-rationalist standing, who opposed earlier philosophical trends and followed, rather, scholarly trends common among the Tosafists of northern France. It has also been observed that some images adopt a more specific anti-Christian stance and address polemical issues....

French, 19th century, male.

Born 10 May 1809, in Boulogne; died 8 April 1877, in Comborn (Corrèze).

Painter, illustrator, art writer. Historical subjects, religious subjects, military subjects, portraits, genre scenes, scenes with figures, rustic scenes, landscapes, harbour scenes. Church decoration.

Philippe Auguste Jeanron studied under Souchon in Lille and then Sigalon in Paris. He made his debut at the Paris Salon in 1831, was awarded a second class medal in 1833 and exhibited further in 1848, 1850, 1852, 1853 and 1855....

Italian, 19th century, male.

Born 28 August 1780, in Pistoia; died 1854.

Painter, fresco artist, illustrator, art writer. Historical subjects, portraits. Wall decorations, church decoration.

Niccolo Monti studied and lived in Florence. In 1818, he travelled to Poland at the invitation of Paul Cieszkovski to decorate the latter's palace and church. He remained in Poland for two years, and during this time painted five frescoes for the palace and three ceilings, one of which represents the ...

[Ōtagaki Nobu]

(b Kyoto, 1791; d Kyoto, 1875).

Japanese poet, calligrapher, potter and painter. Shortly after her birth, she was adopted by Ōtagaki Mitsuhisa who worked at Chion’in, an important Jōdo (Pure Land) sect temple in Kyoto. In 1798 she was sent to serve at Kameoka Castle in Tanba, where she studied poetry, calligraphy and martial arts. She returned to Kyoto in 1807 and was married to a young samurai named Mochihisa. They had three children, all of whom died shortly after birth; in 1815 Mochihisa also died. In 1819 Nobu remarried, but her second husband died in 1823. After enduring the tragic loss of two husbands and all her children, Nobu, only 33 years old, cut her hair off and became a nun, at which time she adopted the name Rengetsu (‘lotus moon’). She lived with her stepfather, who had also taken vows, near Chion’in. After his death in 1832 Rengetsu began to make pottery, which she then inscribed with her own ...

British, 19th century, female.

Born 1834; died 11 February 1862, in London, of a laudanum overdose.

Painter, draughtswoman, illustrator, poet. Religious subjects.

Lizzie Siddal was a dressmaker and worked in a millinery shop. In 1950 the painter Walter Deverell asked her to pose as a central character in his painting ...

[Sigmind]

(b Kassel, Dec 10, 1794; d Kassel, March 7, 1887).

German painter, printmaker, illustrator and writer. After having lessons in drawing from his father, the sculptor and printmaker Johann Christian Ruhl (1764–1842), Ruhl studied from 1806 at the Kassel Kunstakademie. In order to gain a more thorough training in history painting, he spent the winter of 1812–13 studying anatomy at the university at Göttingen and then a year at the Akademie in Dresden.

Ruhl achieved his first successes in Kassel with pictures of horses, as Horse Race in Antiquity (1813; Kassel, Neue Gal.). In 1815, after serving in the Hessian cavalry fighting Napoleon, Ruhl continued his artistic studies in Munich and formed a close association with the painter Carl Philipp Fohr. The two shared an enthusiasm for chivalric romances and undertook joint commissions to illustrate them. Examples by Ruhl include drawings for Ludwig Tieck’s Melusine (c. 1815–16; Kassel, Neue Gal.; Frankfurt am Main, Städel. Kstinst. & Städt. Gal.)....

(b Echigo Prov. [now Niigata Prefect.], 1758; d 1831).

Japanese Zen monk, calligrapher and poet. He became a monk at the age of 18 at the temple Kōshōji, Okayama Prefecture, but, being a wanderer for most of his life, never attained high monastic rank. He is known for his poetry in Japanese and Chinese and his individualistic, indeed idiosyncratic, swiftly brushed style of calligraphy and is one of the most respected calligraphers of the late Edo period, receiving more attention and study than his contemporaries Maki Ryōko and Ichikawa Beian. His modern popularity has given rise to an increasing number of Ryōkan forgeries. Most of his extant calligraphies consist of letters and poems in his own hand, much of the subject-matter deriving from his everyday experiences, as for example the letter brushed in ink on paper between 1806 and 1810 (Tokyo, N. Mus.). Ryōkan studied the 100-character text by the Chinese calligrapher Huaisu, the calligraphy of the legendary 4th-century ...

Russian, 19th century, male.

Born 26 October 1842, in Luibez (Cherepovets district, Novgorod); died 13 April 1904, in Port Arthur (now Lushun, China).

Painter, designer, illustrator, writer. Historical subjects, military subjects, battles, genre scenes, portraits, figures, interiors with figures, church interiors, landscapes, townscapes, seascapes, architectural views, ruins, gardens, animals, birds, costume studies...