This miniature shows the Virgin Mary in a blue mantle holding out the Christ Child to the priest Simeon, shown in a distinctive red skullcap. Joseph stands behind Mary to the left of an altar decorated with a tiny Gothic triptych. The initial ‘S’ opens the introit Suscepimus deus misericoridam for the feast of the Purification of the Virgin Mary (February 2), also known as Candlemas. The initial is decorated with scrolling white vine work and sprays of acanthus in red set on an ornate blue background.

Art historians now attribute this cutting to an artist close to, either in the workshop or a close follower of, Michelino Molinari da Besozzo, known as Michelino da Besozzo (c. 1370-c. 1455), a notable Italian painter and illuminator working in the tradition of the International Gothic Style and employed by the Visconti family, rulers of Milan. For his patron, the duke of Milan, Gian Galeazzo Visconti, Michelino created in 1404 the manuscript illuminations in a funeral oration (BnF, MS lat. 5888).  The artist’s only signed work is the painting of the Mystic Marriage of Saint Catherine in the Pinacoteca Nazionale in Siena (Figure 2).  Compare the composition of the Presentation in the Temple in a Book of Hours in the Morgan Library, M.944 (Figure 1).  Our miniature is probably not by the hand of the artist but many features relate it closely to him and to his attributed works:  the soft modelling of the faces and drapery, the pastel colors, the full faces of the figures and the large size of the baby Jesus.  Compare the drapery also with a series of drawings assigned to a follower (Dusseldorf, Staatliche Kunstakademie, F. P. 3527-3528) (published in M. Bollati, ed., Arte in Lombardia, Milan, 1988, pp. 120-121.  Sister leaves sometimes associated with one of his followers/ students, the Olivetan Master,  may include the initial of Saint Clare (Figure 3).

The miniature is cut close to the black border, the verso with fragments of four lines of text written in a Gothic rotunda in brown ink with part of a rubric in red and part of an initial in blue opening the chant Post partum virgo, with two lines inscribed “Post [partum virgo inviolata perm]a(n)sisti.” The miniature with small spots of water over pigments and a line across the Virgin's blue mantle revealing some underdrawing, otherwise in good condition, the verso with remnants of paper, adhesive, and red wax from former mounts.

Literature:

For comparisons see:

Bistoletti, Sandrina Bandera.  Pittura a Pavia dal romanico al settecentto, ed. Mina Gregori, Milan, 1988

Bollati, Milvia, ed.  Arte in Lombardia tra Gotico e Rinascimento, Milan, 1988.