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Text & Spirit Illuminated Manuscripts from the Museum Collection and Their Digitization
13 March – 22 June 2025
For the first time, the Museum Angewandte Kunst is showcasing its complete collection of late medieval illuminated manuscripts in the Text & Spirit exhibition. These include books and fragments decorated with exquisite illuminations and ornaments in gold, lapis lazuli or purple. What use are books of hours from the Middle Ages to us today? Text & Spirit sheds light on various parallels between then and now, drawing a comparison between the books of hours and today’s smartphones.The focus lies on the impact of both as life companions, which are simultaneously means of communication and objects of prestige. Their significance reaches the status of fashionable, performative accessories. The exhibition thus offers a new perspective on medieval books of hours based on the 21st century as the age of digital communication.
The exhibition is part of a digitisation project funded by the Department of Culture and Science of the City of Frankfurt am Main. As part of the digitisation project, the Museum Angewandte Kunst selected works of art from its collection that were rarely or never exhibited and researched before due to their fragility and exceptional value: Christian prayer books from the late Middle Ages in the form of psalters, breviaries and books of hours as illuminated manuscripts. In the exhibition the manuscripts, with their illuminating aesthetic composed of text, painting, and the employment of precious materials, will be shown in the original. Accompanying questions relating to everyday rituals, standards of value, fashion, art, restoration, or religion open up a dialogue with these books and their epoch. For a later, independent study of the theme, the exhibition also includes video interviews and in-depth literature as an accompaniment to the digital copies.
Curation: Dr Eva Linhart (Head of the Book Art and Graphics Department of the Museum Angewandte Kunst) with Francesco Colli and Sandra Doeller (Design)
Press Release
Biographies of Participants
Information on the Department of Book Art and Graphics at the Museum Angewandte Kunst
The digital copies of the illuminated manuscripts and the cuttings can be found here in the digital collection.
The accompanying video interviews are available in the exhibition space on the gallery and on the YouTube channel of the Museum Angewandte Kunst.
Press Images
Text & Spirit. Illuminated Manuscripts from the Museum Collection and Their Digitization
LM 56
Book of Hours according to the custom of the Roman Church
after 1520, Flanders, Ghent-Bruges School of Painting, 9 × 6.5 × 3.5 cm;
Manuscript on parchment, 247 fol. 88 × 64 mm, type area 59 × 37 mm, single column of 14 lines, Latin text in Humanistica Rotunda in brown and red (headings) ink, 2 full miniatures, 37 small miniatures, painted decorative initials; black leather binding, 17th century, 1 silver clasp, gilt edges.
© Museum Angewandte Kunst
Text & Spirit. Illuminated Manuscripts from the Museum Collection and Their Digitization
LM 43
Book of Hours according to the custom of the Roman Church,
1st half of the 16th century, Northern Italy, 18 × 10 × 2.4 cm;
Manuscript on parchment, 79 fol. 174 × 93 mm, type area 107 × 46 mm, single column of 31 lines, Latin text in humanist cursive in brown and red (headings) ink, 14 miniatures in border frames, gold-grounded decorative initials; olive-colored maroquin binding with gold stamping and silk lining, 17th century, gilt edges.
© Museum Angewandte Kunst
Text & Spirit. Illuminated Manuscripts from the Museum Collection and Their Digitization
LM 48
Book of Hours
c. 1480 – 1490, France, School of Tours, Jean Bourdichon (painter and illuminator), 13.5 × 9.5 × 1.7 cm;
Manuscript on virginal parchment, 131 fol. 132 × 90 mm, type area 75 × 49 mm, single column, Latin and French text in bastarda with brown, black and red (headings) ink, 11 large, 1 small miniature, 2 pictorial initials, 6 marginal borders; brown leather binding, cut and inlaid, blind and gold embossing in the style of Nicolas Eve, gilt edges, bookplate Metzler, formerly M.1.
© Museum Angewandte Kunst
Text & Spirit. Illuminated Manuscripts from the Museum Collection and Their Digitization
LM 46
Antifonary
3rd quarter of the 16th century, Swabia, 23 × 16.5 × 4.4 cm;
Manuscript on parchment; 113 fol., single-column with five lines of notes and text or 28 lines of text, Latin text in textura and notes in black, brown and red (headings) ink, pictorial and decorative initials and tendrils heightened in gold in the margins; brown calfskin binding with gold-pressed borders, front cover with scrollwork cartouche: Christus am Brunnen.
© Museum Angewandte Kunst
Text & Spirit. Illuminated Manuscripts from the Museum Collection and Their Digitization
LM 51
Book of hours according to the custom of the Roman Church
End of the 15th century, Florence, 11.5 × 7.5 × 2.5 cm;
Manuscript on parchment; 155 fol., single-column of 12 lines, Latin text in rotunda in brown ink and red ink for headings, 2 double-page miniatures and inhabited initials in border frames, two pages with tendrils as borders; red marocco binding, 18th century, with painted and gold-pressed ornamentation, gilt edges.
© Museum Angewandte Kunst
Text & Spirit. Illuminated Manuscripts from the Museum Collection and Their Digitization
LM 19
Book of Hours according to the custom of Paris
c. 1400, France, 22 × 16 × 4 cm;
Manuscript on parchment; 131 fol., single-column, 15 lines, Latin text in textura, with black, red and blue ink, fleuronnée letters in blue, red and yellow, decorative initials with borders, 3 miniatures with framed borders; 19th century brown marocco binding.
© Museum Angewandte Kunst
Text & Spirit. Illuminated Manuscripts from the Museum Collection and Their Digitization
LM 11
Book of Hours according to the custom of the Roman Church
1st third of the 15th century, Netherlands and Flanders, 20 × 13.5 × 3.2 cm;
Manuscript on parchment; 115 fol, single-column, 22 lines, Latin and French text in textura in brown, red and blue ink, decorative initials, red headings; pre-bound fragment of an Italian book of hours, containing the Athanasian Creed and the prayer: O domina mea sanctissima; 15 miniatures framed with borders, also 3 miniatures glued to the inside of the cover and stapled in front of the fragment from a third manuscript; gray-violet velvet binding on wood with silver clasps, 16th century, gilt edges.
© Museum Angewandte Kunst
Text & Spirit. Illuminated Manuscripts from the Museum Collection and Their Digitization
LM 16
Psalter
c. 1265, Franconia (?), 12.5 × 10 × 4.3 cm;
Manuscript on parchment; 165 fol., single-column, 18 lines, Latin text in minuscule in brown ink, blue and red initials, eight decorative initials painted on ochre-ground squares, 4 full-page miniatures; dark brown 16th-17th century calfskin binding with medallion and framing, pressed.
© Museum Angewandte Kunst
Text & Spirit. Illuminated Manuscripts from the Museum Collection and Their Digitization
LM 20
Psalterium
3rd quarter of the 13th century, Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur, 20 × 14 × 6.3 cm;
Manuscript on parchment, 255 fol. 186 × 130 mm, type area 132 ×88 mm, single column of 23 lines, Latin and French script in Gothic minuscule, 108 full-page miniatures before and after the text, 10 pictorial initials before the 9 main psalms and the concluding hymns, drolleries, fleuronnée letters; red 17th century maroquin binding with gold embossing.
© Museum Angewandte Kunst
Text & Spirit. Illuminated Manuscripts from the Museum Collection and Their Digitization
LM 24
Book of Hours according to the custom of Paris
1400-1420, France, 19 × 13 × 6.6 cm;
Manuscript on parchment; 216 fol., single-column, 14 lines, Latin and French text in textura in brown ink and red ink for headings, gold decorative initials; brown leather binding on wood with blind-stamped ornamentation of the time.
© Museum Angewandte Kunst
Text & Spirit. Illuminated Manuscripts from the Museum Collection and Their Digitization
LM 34
Book of Hours according to the custom of the Roman Church
3rd quarter of the 15th century, Flanders, Willem Vrelant (illuminator), 12.5 × 9 × 5 cm;
Manuscript on parchment; 217 fol., single-column, 17 lines, Latin text in textura with brown and red ink, 15 miniatures in border framing, decorative initials; green-blue velvet binding with openwork silver clasps, probably from the 16th century, patterned gilt edges.
© Museum Angewandte Kunst
Text & Spirit. Illuminated Manuscripts from the Museum Collection and Their Digitization
LM 78
Fragment
c. 1300, Northern Italy, manuscript on parchment, 58.5 × 39 cm;
Leaf with pictorial initial from an antifonary (fol. 280); initial “M” with praying David and Christ.
© Museum Angewandte Kunst
Please note that the image material may only be used in conjunction with a report on the exhibition and with the citation of the exhibition title in its entirety.