Simon Bening

This week a superb Illuminated manuscript on vellum, in Latin and Dutch, "The Imhof Prayerbook" from the Arcana Collection was sold at Christie's London. It is illuminated by Simon Bening.
Antwerp (and Ghent) by 1511.

Simon Bening b. about 1483 Ghent, Flanders, d. 1561 Bruges, Flanders.
Simon learned his craft in the workshop of his father, the painter Alexander Bening, in Ghent. By 1500, he moved to Bruges.
In addition to producing books for powerful aristocrats such as Cardinal Albrecht of Brandenburg, Bening worked for a group of international royal patrons including Emperor Charles V and Don Fernando, the Infante of Portugal.

"It has been generally accepted that the effaced coat of arms on f.25, discernible if viewed from the reverse against strong light, belongs to the Imhof, one of the patrician families of Nuremberg."

"In his lifetime Bening was described as 'the greatest master in the art of illumination in all of Europe' and he has retained that position among modern critics: 'the art of no other Flemish illuminator so fully epitomises the triumph of Flemish manuscript painting ..."

(Christie's.)



Photograph: masterwatercolors




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