Since 1983, Jeanne Miles Blackburn, a former speech instructor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, has been assembling a distinguished collection of pages from manuscripts of the Middle Ages. This exhibition presents over sixty manuscript pages ranging in date from the mid-thirteenth to the early sixteenth century. Although the collection includes examples of British, German and Italian manuscript painting, its greatest strength is in French and Netherlandish manuscripts. The earliest works are pages of text from bibles and collections of psalms where neatly lettered columns of text are set off by elaborate initial letters. In the later examples, true illustrations appear; paintings that fill a substantial portion of the page and dominate the accompanying text. There are over fifty pages from Books of Hours, the sumptuous devotional picture books made for aristocratic patrons in the late Middle Ages. These books contain a series of short services to be recited at the eight canonical hours of the day. The Book of Hours honors the Virgin Mary, and its central section, the Hours of the Virgin, usually includes devotional images - often events relating to the birth of Christ.

Two illuminations shown here give some idea of the range of the collection. A Parisian miniature from a Book of Hours (c. 1420) shows the Flight into Egypt, the standard subject to open the prayers for Vespers (6:00 p.m.). In a space about four inches high, the artist has found room not only for the holy Family and their donkey, but also for a spacious landscape. Leafy vines seem to grow out from the borders of the picture, filling the entire margin with a delicate, transparent network.

In contrast, the Initial A with St. Francis of Assisi in Prayer, cut from a finely painted choir book made a few years later in Italy, is monumental. Choir books were large - designed to be displayed on a lectern and used by a whole group of singers at once - and this initial letter alone is more than nine inches tall. With little interest in landscape, the Italian artist reduced the landscape setting to a symmetrical pair of sloping hillsides. The setting is both abstract and intensely material. The architectural construction of the letter A pushes forward from the page and the prayers of St. Francis take the form of a gold cross issuing from his mouth.

Manuscript Illuminations is funded in part by the William Hayes Ackland Trust.

Timothy Riggs
Assistant Director for Collections
Ackland Art Museum

Note: On Wednesday, February 7 at 12:15 p.m., join Timothy Riggs for a free gallery talk in conjunction with the exhibition.