Besides the two triptychs in this group of reliquary tabernacles that are attributed to Lippo Vanni in Baltimore and Rome, there is a third in triptych form, attributed to Bartolo di Fredi, now in a private collection in London (plate II). This was discussed above in the context of the suggestion that these tabernacles might be thought of as ‘miniaturisations’ of larger paintings, such as monumental altarpieces. Bartolo di Fredi’s London tabernacle was explored as a candidate for this sort of analysis because aspects of its iconography seem to link it with the St Ansanus/Annunciation altarpiece, signed by Simone Martini and Lippo Memmi in 1333, and painted for the relic altar in Siena Cathedral dedicated in honour of St Ansanus (Fig. 15). Here, though, another striking aspect of the London tabernacle – unique among surviving examples – will be discussed: its inclusion of a pair of carved ivory reliefs in the middle of the painted and gilded centre panel of the triptych. The aesthetic, theological and devotional possibilities offered by this multiplication of media in the London triptych will be discussed here, alongside the significance of different kinds of materials and the connotations of luxury that they offer in the reliquary tabernacles. The relationships between the various types of artistic materials used in the tabernacles and the relics displayed around their margins will also be examined here. The frame as a significant zone of meaning within these objects will be considered, as will the ways in which the framing zones interact visually and conceptually with the images that are placed in the centres of the tabernacles.

PAINTING AND SCULPTED RELIEF

We have already examined above various types of interactions that appear to have been taking place between different media within the central Italian artistic and cultural milieu into which these tabernacles emerged in the middle of the fourteenth century. Architecture, metalwork, sculpture and painting all took their place in an atmosphere of inter-medial quotation and adaptation, in which artists seem to have enjoyed presenting one type of artistic production in ways that referred to forms and traditions of other types of object. In the specific context of these reliquary tabernacles, the relationship between tabernacles or retables and altars (and especially, perhaps, tomb-altars) forms one particular type of iconographical and conceptual conversation, and the relationships between statues and paintings forms another, each of which has been examined above.