The Shadow of the Monogram In the quiet workshops of the Southern Netherlands, perhaps within the bustling streets of Ghent, a hand moved with precision across parchment. We know this hand only by a mark left in gold—an I superimposed upon an M. This small, gilded signature, tucked into the corner of a sacred scene, remains the only whisper of a life that once breathed life into the illuminated pages of a missal. The artist lived during a time when the devotion of the faithful was captured in the delicate application of tempera, turning a simple leaf of parchment into a window for prayer. The…