Lot 144: *BARTOLOMEO DI FRUOSINO (1366-1441)

bodycolour and gold on vellum, the lower border missing and the corner sections of the vertical friezes attached slightly higher (approx. 22mm.) the verso extensively inscribed with text taken from the Common of Saints, and datable to circa 1420 Bartolomeo di Fruosino was a pupil and follower of Agnolo Gaddi, with whom he worked on the frescoes in the Cappella del Sacro Cingolo (Chapel of the Holy Girdle) in Prato, though almost certainly he only contributed to the decorative details. Like a number of other artists of his generation, Bartolomeo di Fruosino was not just an illuminator (`dipintore') but he also executed paintings and frescoes: in his tax declarations he described himself as both a painter and an illuminator, and a crucifix of 1411, painted for Santa Maria degli Angeli in Florence, survives (see M. Levi d'Ancona, Literature below, illus. fig. 60). After Gaddi's death in 1396, Bartolomeo di Fruosino collaborated with Lorenzo Monaco; to whose circle this manuscript was once ascribed. In fact the overall composition of the Crucifixion is entirely typical of Lorenzo Monaco and his school, and the geometric borders reappear on another manuscript leaf designed by Lorenzo and executed by Bartolomeo (The Bernard H. Breslauer Collection of Manuscript Illuminations, exhibition catalogue, New York, Pierpont Morgan Library, 1993, cat. no. 74, illus.). That and the present sheet both originated from a choir-book from Santa Maria degli Angeli in Florence. Most of the choir-books, except for a number of missing and/or stolen leaves, are held today at the Biblioteca Laurenziana, Florence. This particular leaf belonged to Corale 7 (folio 45) and since the Corale is dated 1406, Bartolomeo's contribution to this sheet in particular can be dated to the same period (though the writing on the verso appears to date from circa 1420). Bartolomeo di Fruosino is first recorded at Santa Maria Nuova on July 12, 1402, for having painted some images of crutches (`segnali della gruccia'), symbols of the Hospital. Towards the end of the second decade of the 15th century Bartolomeo was employed, illuminating the Antiphonaries of Santa Maria Nuova, and payments continued throughout the 1420s and '30s, until June 30, 1437. Bartolomeo evidently lived well on the salary provided by his craft, so much so that he gave 200 gold fiorini to the church in 1422. The figures on this leaf are typical of Bartolomeo and are closely comparable to other figures in his securely attributable works: see, for example, two miniatures in Florence - one in the Arcispedale di Santa Maria Nuova and the other in the Museo di San Marco - in which the figures have the same angular heads and triangular noses. A characteristic of Bartolomeo's figures which has already been noted is the wish to show as much of their features as possible, even when their faces are shown in three-quarter profile. Mirelli Levi D'Ancona (see Literature below, p. 61) observes, `Of all the artists we have considered so far, Bartolomeo di Fruosino is the one who grapples the most with Renaissance problems of light, space, and composition, although these elements are not fully integrated together, so that the overall effect of his illuminations is not yet fully of the Renaissance. However, we do see its origins'. The four figures in the lower corners and halfway up each vertical side are probably the four Evangelists though they are not accompanied by their symbols and may, therefore, be merely angels. The sun and moon in the upper corners allude to a line in the synoptic gospels, relating that on the day of the Crucifixion darkness fell over the Earth from noon until three, and they may also refer to Saint Augustine's interpretation of the sun and moon as the New and the Old Testaments respectively: the Old (moon) can only be understood by the light shed upon it by the New (sun). The pelican upper center is a familiar symbol of the sacrifice exemplified by the crucified Christ, and is seen in many forms of art from the thirteenth century onwards. Its symbolism derived from a belief that the female pelican smothered her young with excessive love, and that the male restored them to life, forfeiting his own in the process, by stabbing his breast with his beak and giving them his own blood. This act of sacrifice served as a parallel to Christ dying on the Cross to redeem mankind.

Sale: Sotheby's, London, July 11, 1966, lot 193 (as by a Follower of Lorenzo Monaco) Sale: Christie's, London, June 29, 1994, lot 15 (as Bartolomeo di Fruosino)