School of Paris (Middle Ages)

Page from the Belleville Breviary by Jean Pucelle, 1320s.

School of Paris refers to the many manuscript illuminators, whose identities are mostly unknown, who made Paris an internationally important centre of illumination throughout the Romanesque and Gothic periods of the Middle Ages, and for some time into the Renaissance.[1] Among the most famous of these artists were Master Honoré,[2][3] Jean Pucelle[4][5] and Jean Fouquet.[6]

The Limbourg brothers,[7] originally from the Netherlands, also spent time in Paris, as well as Burgundy and Bourges, but their style is not typical of the School of Paris of the day.

Many of the painters in Parisian workshops were women. Gradually, especially from 1440 onwards, Parisian illuminators lost international customers, such as the English elites, to their Flemish competitors, based in particular in Bruges and Ghent.[8] Around the same time Tours became for a time the most important French centre.[9]

  1. ^ Jones
  2. ^ Branner, Robert (1977) Manuscript Painting in Paris During the Reign of Saint Louis: A Study of Styles. Berkeley: University of California Press]
  3. ^ Holmes, George (1992). The Oxford History of Medieval Europe. Great Britain: Oxford University Press. p. 315.
  4. ^ Gould, Karen (March 1992). "Jean Pucelle and Northern Gothic Art: New Evidence from Strasbourg Cathedral". The Art Bulletin. 74 (1): 51–74. doi:10.2307/3045850. JSTOR 3045850.
  5. ^ Randall, Lilian (April 1964). "Reviewed Work: Jean Pucelle by Kathleen Morand". Speculum. 39 (2): 331–332. doi:10.2307/2852746. JSTOR 2852746.
  6. ^ Encyclopaedia Britannica
  7. ^ Limbourg brothers (1385-1416) – Among the last Illuminators of the Medieval Art
  8. ^ Jones
  9. ^ French illuminated manuscripts: late fourteenth to early sixteenth century - British Library