A MONUMENTAL MICROGRAPHIC BIBLICAL PLAQUE, LEVI DAVID VAN GELDER, LONDON: 1859

A magnificent display of biblical artistry and micrographic penmanship.

The talented artist Levi David Van Gelder (1815-1878) produced the earliest examples of his beautiful micrographic mizrah plaques during the 1840s while working as a printer and lithographer in his native Amsterdam. It was there that he developed his distinctive style by imaginatively combining minuscule Dutch texts with oversize decorative word panels and biblical imagery. By 1853, Van Gelder had moved to England, from which he immigrated to the United States, settling in Chicago in 1864.

The present, newly-discovered monumental micrographic plaque, executed during a sojourn in London (at 31 Brick Lane, Spitalfields), is one of only three known manuscript versions of Van Gelder’s unique artistic style. One hundred ten biblical vignettes and portraits, running the gamut from images of Adam and Eve to the prophets and kings of Israel, are here surrounded by captions, numerous biblical texts, and excerpts from the liturgy inscribed in fine micrographic lettering and elegantly hand-colored. The printed scenes were taken from contemporary Bibles or books of biblical history, while the eight enlarged red and blue collage elements were done by hand on separate paper and affixed to the plaque.

Van Gelder was a Freemason and served as the Captain General of the Siloam Masonic Lodge in Chicago. This plaque incorporates several Masonic symbols, including the Anchor, the Flask, and several almond-shaped cartouches evoking the Eye of Providence. In addition to his artistic endeavors and Masonic proclivities, Van Gelder was a Jewish mystic or ba‘al shem (master of the Name) who made amulets to ward off disease, notably during the epidemic of yellow fever that swept Louisiana and Tennessee in 1878. In retrospect, this helps to explain his predilection towards large devotional plaques with clear kabbalistic antecedents.

The level of complexity and exacting detail manifest in the present work establishes it as a masterpiece of Van Gelder’s known oeuvre.

Literature

Leila Avrin, Micrography as Art (Paris: Centre national de la recherche scientifique; Jerusalem: Israel Museum, Department of Judaica, 1981).

Stanley Ferber, “Micrography: A Jewish Art Form,” Journal of Jewish Art 3-4 (1977): 12-24.

Alice M. Greenwald, “The Masonic Mizrah and Lamp: Jewish Ritual Art as a Reflection of Cultural Assimilation,” Journal of Jewish Art 10 (1984): 87-101.