L’albâtre de Beuda (Gérone, Catalogne, Espagne), un matériau marqueur de la sculpture gothique en France méridionale révélé par les analyses multi-isotopiques (S, O, Sr)

Bromblet, Philippe; Kloppmann, Wolfram; Leroux, Lise; Pogam, Pierre-Yves Le; García, Carmen Morte; Pozo, Alicia Muñoz del

doi:10.4000/archeosciences.7709

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“…Both used an alabaster described as “covered with distinctive network of grey veins around 2 mm thick and resembling blood vessels” [ 1 ] ( Fig 2A ). We make use of the proven capacity of Sr, S and O isotope fingerprints to discriminate historical European alabaster deposits [ 19 – 21 ] to verify this intriguing resemblance, to test the provenance of the material used by both the Master of Rimini and by Riemenschneider, and, ultimately, to provide new evidence to the identity of the Master of Rimini and the location of his workshop by identifying his supply chains. We then confront our geochemical results with the rare written medieval sources on artwork of the Rimini group that we have investigated in some more detail, going back to some of the original manuscripts.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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A pan-European art trade in the late middle ages: Isotopic evidence on the master of Rimini enigma

Kloppmann

Leroux

Bromblet³

et al. 2022

PLoS ONE

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The identity of artists and localisation of workshops are rarely known with certainty before the mid-15th century. We investigated the material used by one of the most prolific and enigmatic medieval sculptors, the Master of the Rimini Altarpiece or Master of Rimini, active around 1420–40. The isotope fingerprints (Sr, S and O) of a representative corpus of masterpieces but also minor artworks, attributed to the Master of Rimini and his workshop, are virtually identical, demonstrating the unity of the corpus and a material evidence behind the stylistic and iconographic ascriptions. The material used is exclusively Franconian (N-Bavarian) alabaster, 600 km distant from the supposed zone of activity of the Master of Rimini workshop according to recent literature. The same material was later used by the prominent Late Medieval German carver Tilman Riemenschneider, active in Würzburg after 1483, whose small corpus of alabaster sculptures we have been able to characterize almost entirely. Based on these findings, we propose here an alternative to the prevailing hypothesis of a Flemish or N-French workshop being founded on similarities of the Rimini sculpture with motives in Flemish and French painting. Our scenario, returning to the initial proposal of a German localisation of the Master of Rimini workshop, assumes the migration of an artist, perhaps trained in the Low Countries or strongly inspired by the Flemish art, to Southern Germany where he founded a highly productive export workshop, well situated on the crossroads of medieval trade, with a pan-European radiance. This study sheds a spotlight on the on the trade networks of luxury goods, the raw material used for their production, and the high-end art market in Europe as well as on international migration of artists and styles, at the eve of the Renaissance.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…87 Sr/ 86 Sr for artwork and Franconian quarries. For comparison: principal deposits previously identified to have delivered alabaster for 14 th to 16 th century sculpture in W Europe [ 19 – 21 ], renormalised to V-CDT. R-W: Riemenschneider and workshop .…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%