Ende (artist)

Ende (or En) is the first Spanish female manuscript illuminator to have her work documented through inscription: ENDE PINTRIX ET D(E)I AIUTRIX in the colophon of the Gerona Beatus.[1] She was probably a nun.[1] There are a number of hands discernible in the manuscripts. The chief scribe was a priest called Senior. Historians have also attributed elements of the manuscripts to Emetrius, whose style is attributable in comparison to an earlier signed work.[1] However, based on painting style attributes, some theorists conclude that nearly all of the manuscript illustrations were completed by Ende.[2]

The Last Judgment, painted by Ende, from the Gerona Beatus

Ende worked on a 10th-century group of manuscripts, of which there are 26 known copies with illustrations, however only Beatus of Girona contains the work of a woman.[3] These manuscripts contain the Commentary on the Apocalypse compiled by the Spanish monk Beatus of Liébana in 786.[1] The manuscripts were created in the monastery of Tabara in the mountains of[3] Leon in northwest Spain.[1]

The illuminations illustrate the Apocalyptic Vision of St. John the Divine in the Book of Revelation in the Mozarabic style.[4] This style developed in Spain after the Muslim invasions, blending elements of Islamic art and decorative traditions, particularly the emphasis on geometry, rich colors, ornamented grounds, and stylized figures.[4]

References
  1. Gaze, Delia (1997). Dictionary of women artists. Fitzroy Dearborn. pp. 498-499. ISBN 1884964214. OCLC 185867951.
  2. Miner, Dorothy E. (1974). Anastaise and her sisters : women manuscript illuminators of the Middle Ages : a twentieth anniversary keepsake, the Baltimore Bibliophiles, 12 November 1974. Walters Art Gallery. OCLC 609732758.
  3. Tsjeng, Zing. Forgotten Women The Artists. Octopus Publishing Ltd. pp. 158–160. ISBN 9781788400176.
  4. Dodwell, C. R. (1993). The pictorial arts of the West, 800-1200 (1. publ. ed.). New Haven: Yale Univ. Press. p. 247. ISBN 0300053487.

Further reading
  • Chadwick, Whitney, Women, Art, and Society, Thames and Hudson, London, 1990
  • Harris, Anne Sutherland and Linda Nochlin, Women Artists: 1550-1950, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Knopf, New York, 1976
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