Painting the flesh
Artists' Techniques
The materials and techniques used by each of the artists to paint flesh tones are amongst their most characteristic traits. Hands A, B, C and D all painted a blue base layer for flesh tones with woad, which is one of the most distinctive features of the decoration. The subsequent pink surfaces, red outlines and white highlights were applied as distinct layers. This is especially visible in the figures painted by Hand C, whose facial features are angular and exaggerated.
The Gaibana Master used earth pigments in flesh tones, which have a greenish rather than blue undertone. His Associate employed large amounts of azurite instead. The careful blending of paint layers by both artists results in much smoother modelling of faces compared to that found in faces painted by the other illuminators.
Nativity
Hand B employed traditional Byzantine iconography, showing the Nativity in a landscape setting and including the shepherds as well as the new-born Christ Child about to receive his first bath. He also emulated the Gaibana Master’s broccoli-like trees. However, the emphatically linear, graphic style is characteristic of contemporary German painting and illumination.