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Openwork diptych, 3 registers (plaques ajourée) (Wing, left)

Openwork diptych, 3 registers (plaques ajourée) (Wing, left)
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Front

Front

Wing, right.

Wing, left

Wing, right

Front

Back, closed

Case

Subject
Religious. Saints. Infancy of Christ. Passion.

Repository Institution
www.vam.ac.uk

To purchase an image
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London, Victoria and Albert Museum

A.553-1910

Boiled leather, wood and gesso (case);wood, tinted bone used for alla certosina marquetry (intarsia frame);maroon silk (later lining of the case);ivory;painted vellum (background)

Height: 204 mm (ivory only)
Width: 225 mm (case)
Depth: 55 mm (case)

Wing, left
Register 1: Saint Agnes with a lamb and book. Annunciation; vase of lilies; dove of the Holy Spirit. Saint Catherine of Alexandria with broken wheel and martyr's palm. Nativity and Annunciation to the Shepherds. Saint Mary Magdalene covered in her hair.
Register 2: saint Barbara holding a tower and a martyr's palm. Presentation in the Temple; Christ standing on the altar between the Virgin and Simeon; maid holding a candlestick and a basket of doves brought as offerings. Saint Margaret emerging from the dragon, holding a crucifix. Flight into Egypt. Saint Veronica holding a cloth with the Holy Face of Christ (Sancta Facies).
Register 3: saint Agatha. Death of the Virgin (Dormition); Christ holding the soul of the Virgin. Saint Apollonia, bare-chested, tied to a column. Coronation of the Virgin; bench decorated with tracery; Christ holding an orb in his left hand; two angels swinging censers. Saint Clare.
Wing, right
Register 1: Saint Laurence holding a gridiron. Carrying of the Cross with the Virgin helping Christ; Holy Women; man holding a hammer. Saint Michael and the devil. Crucifixion; Virgin and one of the Holy Women; saint John the Evangelist and onlooker. Saint Nicasius.
Register 2: saint Denis holding his head. Three Holy Women at the Tomb, with angel seated on the tomb and three soldiers asleep; ointment pot; tomb decorated with crosshatching. Saint John the Baptist holding the Lamb of God (Agnus Dei); camel hide. Christ appearing to the Holy Women. Saint Stephen holding a stone.
Register 3: Saint Louis with crown, sceptre with fleur-de-lys and hand of justice. Flagellation. Saint Christopher carrying Christ across the river. Agony in the Garden (Christ at Gethsemane); hand of God; apostles asleep. Saint Francis of Assisi.
Openwork tracery.

Case:
Sides and top: spirals surrounding five circular medallions which enclose in the centre, on one side, the coat of arms of Boucher d'Orsay (gules semy of crosslets argent, a lion rampant or now barely legible), and on the other, of Raguier (a saltire sable between four partridges proper). At the corners, female figures in bust, in gesso, amid foliage. The decoration also includes animals (hares, dogs, deer, birds) and flowers; on the top of the cover : two swans and an owl.


Koechlin Number: 0860

Molinier 1890: Flemish in an Italian frame, 2nd half of the 14th century.
Koechlin 1924: France, 1st half of the 15th century
Longhurst 1929: France, beginning of the 15th century.
Leeuwenberg 1969: French (?), last quarter of the 18th century to 1st half of the 19th century.
Williamson and Davies 2014: French (Paris) or Northern Italian (Milan?), probably about 1414.


Attribution
Master of the Agrafe Forgeries (Leeuwenberg 1969)

Hinges
Two hinges on frame.

Polychromy - Gilding
Painted vellum background with a red, gold and blue diapered pattern.

Reverse
Alla certosina marquetry. Labels indicating the earlier provenance, label with inscription: '32'.

Object Condition
Missing: small section of bone and wood from lower left outer corner of the right wing.

Comments
The diptych is contained in a 15th-century cut and punched leather and wood case (cuir bouilli)(Inv. A.553a-1910). The sides and top of the case are decorated with spirals surrounding five circular medallions which enclose in the centre, on one side, the coat of arms of Boucher d'Orsay (gules semy of crosslets argent, a lion rampant or now barely legible), and on the other, of Raguier (a saltire sable between four partridges proper). At the corners female figures in bust, in gesso, amid foliage. The decoration also includes animals (hares, dogs, deer, birds) and flowers; on the top of the cover : two swans and an owl.
On the sides, there are six loops for a cord.

Provenance
Originally commissioned by Bureau Boucher (d. 1461), Lord of Piscop and Orsay, in Essonne, and Counsellor to Charles VI, probably on the occasion of his marriage to Gillette Raguier (d. 1481) in 1414 (coats of arms on the case). Collection of M. Bellaighe de Bughas (in 1867). Collection of Frédéric Spitzer (b. 1815, d. 1890), Paris: his sale, Chevallier and Mannheim, Paris, 17 April 1893, lot 107; collection of George Salting: bequeathed to the museum by Salting, 1910.

Bibliography
Exposition universelle, exhibition catalogue, Paris, 1867, no. 1774.
La Collection Spitzer (Paris, 1890), I, no. 72 (E. Molinier).
'Salting Bequest (A. 70 to A. 1029-1910)/Murray Bequest (A. 1030 to A. 1096-1910)', in List of Works of Art Acquired by the Victoria and Albert Museum (Department of Architecture and Sculpture) (London, 1910), p. 91.
O. Pelka, Elfenbein (Berlin, 1920), p. 206, figs. 136-7.
R. Koechlin, Les Ivoires gothiques français (Paris, 1924), I, pp. 320, 321, 324; II, no. 860.
M. Longhurst, Catalogue of Carvings in Ivory, Victoria and Albert Museum, 2 vols (London, 1927 and 1929), II (1929), p. 37.
G. Gall, Leder im europaischen Kunsthandwerk (Brunswick, 1965), pp. 106-10, fig. 76.
J. Leeuwenberg, 'Early Nineteenth-Century Gothic Ivories', in Aachener Kunstblätter 39 (1969), pp. 111-148 (pp. 122-124, fig. 23).
P. Williamson and G. Davies, Medieval Ivory Carvings 1200-1550 (London, 2014), no. 112.


Image

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