Pentimenti
Artists' Techniques
The artist made several small changes to his compositions, as shown by elements which were sketched but never painted.
Notable examples include the serpent’s wing on fol. 4r, a carpet in the lower left scene on fol. 5v and the angel appearing in Joseph’s dream on fol. 7v.
A more significant change, which probably involved the entire scene, was made to the image of God and Gabriel on fol. 7v. The infrared image clearly shows the presence of an architectural interior, with arches at the top and a column on the right. The lower portion of a figure’s crossed legs is also visible, as well as his feet.
Select the ‘infrared’ layer and explore the hotspots in the folios on the right to see the pentimenti.
Mary praying; God sending Gabriel; Joseph’s dream
Several pentimenti are hidden beneath the paint layers on this page; in some cases, they can be perceived with the naked eye, through the light blue azurite used in the sky. They are more easily seen in the near-infrared image and become even clearer in the images recorded using infrared reflectography (hotspots 1 and 2).