In its Style Manifesto, the Research Group on Manuscript Evidence defines the principles of its approach to publications. Foremost is the principle that form and content must be appropriate for function and audience.

A New, Illustrated Version with Our Font Bembino

Opening Page in the New Version (May 2015)

As the Research Group launches its new, updated official website in May 2015, it issues the new version of its Style Manifesto.  Circulated as a booklet, it is available here.

It now takes the form of a 4-page booklet, laid out in our own multilingual font Bembino.  The Style Manifesto describes, demonstrates, and illustrates our continuing dedication to the principled, unified approach to our Publications.

These principles pertain, of course, also to the reproduction of images, including photographs of manuscripts and other forms of material evidence. In the new booklet, the horizontal pair of half-page plates present 2 views of the same late-medieval manuscript page (subject of our blogpost on The Mass of Saint Gregory, Illustrated), un-cropped and un-retouched.  These views represent photographs taken with the same lighting but different backgrounds, and with both a scale ruler and a color guide in view.

Such practices can supply guides to convey the integrity of the object and to aid the viewer to assess the accuracy, or otherwise, of images as presented variably in print or on screen.  They may encourage consideration of the specific circumstances and choices governing any given photograph, which might represent only some aspects of the original which other choices could supplement, just as different snapshots or portraits may reveal different aspects of the same sitter.  This position fosters the integrated approach which the Research Group seeks to promote.

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