1018 Illuminated Letter Gothic ‘D’ COMMISSION

Artist Code: 1018. Completed July 2010. Original SOLD. Water colour and metallic gold powder mixed with gum arabic on Aquarelle Arches 100% hot pressed cotton rag. Unframed size 9″ x 12″ [No Products].

This commissioner asked me to design and paint an illuminated Gothic letter T in 2009 for a grandson’s birthday. T’s Mum liked it so much, that she herself had a C for her birthday, and then Mum’s husband liked both so much, that he asked for a D for his birthday! The commissioner has mentioned to me later that all three illuminations had been framed and hung together as a “conversation piece”.

The design for this illumination, created in the traditional Gothic style, is based on a page of the Grey-FitzPayn Book of Hours (circa 1300) currently housed in the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, which I had visited a few weeks prior to the commission coming through. I remembered the delicate fill-in filigrŽe pattern and the straggling flora patterns, which served very well to surround this initial. The war figures and open book illustrate D’s penchant for the Zulu war and for books in general.