More about The Splendor of the Word: Medieval and Renaissance Illuminated Manuscripts at The New York Public Library exhibit. |
| The makers of medieval illuminated manuscripts invested their books with sparkle and visual energy, to stimulate delight, imagination, and memory -- to make of them objects that fascinate and charm as well as instruct. Specialists and non-specialists alike will love to look at these beautiful volumes for the quality of the illuminations and the aesthetic ebullience. This catalogue shows and discusses the 100 volumes put on display for the very first time in the exhibition of the same name, and provides a wonderful view of the ways books help define social, intellectual, and imaginative horizons of their users. The New York Public Library’s collection of nearly three hundred Western European illuminated manuscripts is one of the largest in America but also one that is very little known. Dating from the turn of the 10th century until well into the period of the Renaissance, these works give vivid testimony to the creative impulses of the often nameless craftsmen who continually discovered new ways of animating the contents of hand-produced books through inventive and sometimes exuberant manipulations of all the elements of the book: form and format, layout, script, decoration, illustration, and binding. To introduce this magnificent collection and many of its most important works to scholars and the wider audience, The Splendor of the Word presents 100 manuscripts of particular cultural, historical, and artistic significance, selected from the Library’s collection by three of the most distinguished scholars in the field: Jonathan J. G. Alexander, Professor of Fine Arts at the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, a specialist in early medieval, Romanesque, and Italian illuminated manuscripts; James H. Marrow, Professor Emeritus of Art History at Princeton University, a specialist in late medieval illuminated manuscripts; and Lucy Freeman Sandler, Professor of Art History Emerita at New York University, a specialist in Gothic illuminated manuscripts. The Splendor of the Word Exhibit Catalogue, paperback, with 200 color illustrations, introduction +420 pages. back to Archives & Manuscripts section | back to Library Exhibitions | back to Exhibition & Lecture Books | back to NYPL Publications | back to Books | Library Shop Home |