Bartolozzi

Bartolozzi, Francesco, the son of a Florentine silversmith, was born in 1728 or 1730. His talent for designing was so great that he was put under teachers of painting, and then studied engraving with Wagner at Venice. After a first essay in this art at Rome he came to London in 1764, and for nearly forty years was busily engaged in producing engravings and mezzotints from the works of Cipriani, Angelica Kauffmann, and other artists, the copies often being superior to the originals. His Clytie, after A. Carracci, and his Virgin and Child, after Carlo Dolce, with the plates done for Boydell's Shakespeare, are among the best known of his works. The market at present is flooded with feeble impressions from worn-out plates that do little justice to his merits. In 1802 he went to Lisbon to establish a school of engraving, and died there in 1815. He was the father of Madame Vestris.