GHISI Giorgio

‘il Mantovano’ (Mantua 1520 – 1582)

Giorgio Ghisi was an Italian draftsmanr, painter, engraver and ageminator (decorator of arms with gold and silver threads). He was born in Mantua by a family native of Parma.
Though there is no news on Ghisi’s artistic formation, it is certain that it was under the influence of Giulio Romano, present in Mantua since 1524 at the service of Federico II Gonzaga.

However, it is probable that the artist began his professional career at the school of Giovan Battista Scultori (1503-1575), engraver in Mantua and collaborator of Giulio Romano at Palazzo Tè. The first works attributed to him, for stylistic reasons and for the recurrence of his monogram, all come from Giulio’s models and are dated around 1540. Perhaps after the death of the latter in 1546, Ghisi preferred to move to Rome.

In the lively Roman artistic enviroment, Ghisi had the opportunity to enrich his training and, at the same time, to get acquainted with many important people, such as the publisher Hieronymus Cock. With him, Ghisi began an intense collaboration that, around 1550, took him to Antwerp, one of the major cultural centers in Europe, where Cock published prints and books under the sign ‘aux quatre vents’, for about five years. During his time in Flanders, he performed many high-quality engravings so that in 1551 “Joorgen Mantewaen” was a member of the Guild of Saint Luke.

It is possible that, once he left Antwerp, his destination would be France. In fact, the engravings dating to this period were published with the royal privilege, and subjects were often taken from works by Italian artists active in Fontainebleau or Paris.
However, his latest commissions were in Mantua for the Gonzaga family, from 1574 to 1582. Probably, his very last work is represented by a homogenous series of four plates made to illustrate the Missal of St. Barbara, published in 1583.

According to ancient sources, Ghisi was also active as an arms decorator: a shield located at the British Museum in London is dated 1554, while the signed sword in the Museum of Fine Arts of Budapest date 1570. After a short illness, Ghisi died in Mantua, without children, in December 1582.