Tulips, Insect, and Worm

Tulips, a caterpillar and a worm, painted around a page of calligraphy. Two tulips in pink and red rise on slender stems, while a green caterpillar and a small worm crawl nearby, all painted with the precision of a miniature. Above and around them, flowing lines of calligraphy fill the page with black and gold.

This page belongs to one of the most extraordinary books of the Renaissance: a model book of writing, made to show off every style of script, to which a painter added, thirty years later, flowers, fruits and insects that seem to play with the letters.

Why it works on your wall

• Delicate and precious: a refined image for a study, a library or a bedroom
• Botanical and calligraphic: the precision of a natural history study with the beauty of a manuscript page
• Framing tip: a gold or thin black frame and a cream mount suit its manuscript look; group it with other Hoefnagel pages

The Model Book of Calligraphy

Between 1561 and 1562, Georg Bocskay, secretary to Emperor Ferdinand I, wrote this book of calligraphy in Vienna. Around 1591–1596, Emperor Rudolf II asked the Flemish painter Joris Hoefnagel (1542–1601) to illuminate it, and he added flowers, fruits, insects and small animals to its pages. The book, known as the Mira calligraphiae monumenta, is now in the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles.

• Calligrapher: Georg Bocskay (died 1575)
• Illuminator: Joris Hoefnagel (1542–1601)
• Date: writing 1561–1562, illumination c. 1591–1596
• Technique: watercolour, gouache, gold and silver on parchment
• Original: J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles

Your print

• Colours restored from a high-definition scan of the original
• Printed in Europe on thick archival matte paper, FSC certified
• From A4 to A0, plus 40×60, 50×70, 60×90 and 70×100 cm and 12×18 to 27×40 inch sizes, all made for standard frames
• Free shipping, no minimum order. Shipped rolled in a sturdy tube

Pair it with Hoefnagel’s Caterpillar, Pear, Tulip and Purple Snail, read our article on Joris Hoefnagel, or explore all our Joris Hoefnagel prints.