Muziano, Girolamo

Muziano, Girolamo a distinguished Italian painter, was born at Acquafredda, near Brescia, in 1528. He painted a number of Biblical and religious subjects, one of which, the Resurrection of Lazarus, was greatly admired by Michael Angelo, who pronounced him one of the greatest painters of his time. Muziano is chiefly celebrated by his efforts to advance the art of working in mosaics, which, up to this period, was merely an ornamental art of inlaying stones, but which he perfected almost to a rivalry with painting. He was a great favorite with pope Gregory XIII, who employed him to paint a picture of St. Paul the hermit, and another of St. Anthony, for the church of St. Peter. Sixtus V also held Muziano in esteem, and intrusted to him the designs for the bass-reliefs of the column of Trajan. At the instance of this artist, pope Gregory founded the Academy of St. Luke, which Sixtus confirmed by a brief; and Muziano gave two houses to the institution. He also built the Capella Gregoriana at Rome. He died at Rome in 1590, and was buried in the church of Santa Maria Maggiore, near the spot where his picture of the Resurrection of Lazarus was placed. Many of his pictures have been engraved. His celebrated picture, Christ Washing the Feet of his Disciples, which is in the cathedral at Rheims, has been engraved by Desplaces. See Lanzi, Hist. of Painting, transl. by Roscoe (Lond. 1847, 3 volumes, 8vo), 1:417; 2:184; Spooner, Biog. Hist. of the Fine Arts (N. Y. 1865, 2 vols. 8vo); Jameson and Eastlake, Hist. of' Our Lord (Lond. 1864, 2 volumes, 8vo), 1:361.