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(b Mantua, Sept 23, 1690; d Mantua, Aug 18, 1769).

Italian painter. He was the son of the goldsmith Giovanni Bazzani and trained in the studio of Giovanni Canti (1653–1715). Giuseppe was a refined and cultivated artist (Tellini Perina, 1988) and as a young man profited from the rich collections of art in Mantua, studying the works of Andrea Mantegna, Giulio Romano, 16th-century Venetian painters, especially Paolo Veronese, and Flemish artists, above all Rubens. His earliest works, for example the Assumption (Milan, priv. col., see Caroli, pl. 20), reveal an affinity with contemporary Venetian painters such as Giovanni Battista Piazzetta, Federico Bencovich and Andrea Celesti, but Bazzani rapidly absorbed the influence of Antonio Balestra, Domenico Fetti and most of all Rubens and Veronese. The inspiration of the last two artists is apparent in a number of works that may be dated in the 1720s and early 1730s. These include the Miracles of Pius V, the Conversion of a Heretic...

(b Córdoba, 1716; d Córdoba, 1793).

Spanish gold- and silversmith. He qualified as master of the guild of goldsmiths in Córdoba in 1736, and his earliest-known pieces follow the Baroque tradition prevalent there in the early 18th century and in particular the work of his father-in-law, Bernabé García de los Reyes (1696–1750). By the end of the 1750s his curving outlines and decoration (e.g. fonts in Caracas Cathedral) were Rococo in form, and this was the style that was to predominate in his work from the 1760s. He was appointed Cathedral Goldsmith in 1761 and made a number of ecclesiastical pieces (e.g. pyx, 1761, Córdoba, Mezquita; monstrance, 1768, La Orotava, Tenerife, Concepción Church; several pieces for the Bishop of Segovia, Martín Descalzo, 1769). He made several monstrances, including one (1769; in situ) for S Nicolás de la Villa, Córdoba, and one (1779–80; untraced) for Sigüenza Cathedral, for Cardinal Delgado, his most important patron. Castro’s work is characterized by the use of extended and twisted shafts (e.g. chalice, ...

(b Paris, baptJune 10, 1646; d Paris, Dec 31, 1732).

French sculptor and bronze-caster. He came from a family of goldsmiths of Flemish origin who settled in Paris in the early 17th century. Early biographers state that he trained with Michel or François Anguier and at the Académie Royale. He spent six years at the Académie de France in Rome, where he is said to have studied above all the sculpture of Bernini. This was followed by four years in Venice. He applied for admission to the Académie in 1678, and he was received (reçu) in 1681 with a marble statuette of Polyphemus (Paris, Louvre), inspired by Annibale Carracci’s fresco in the Palazzo Farnese, Rome. From this time until 1720 he enjoyed a highly successful career in royal service and in the employ of the Church and of private clients. He devoted much energy to the affairs of the academy, eventually holding the office of Chancellor. He worked in every branch of sculpture, from monumental marble and bronze statues to small bronze statuettes and candlesticks....

(b S Payo de Ruilhe, Braga, 1710–20; d Oporto, Nov 11, 1784).

Portuguese silversmith. Nothing is known of his early career. He was established in Oporto as a member of the Confraria de S Eloi (Confraternity of St Eligius) by 1747, as his name appears in a list of signatories to the ‘Covenant and Statutes of the workers in silver of the city of Oporto’ and to later additions to the Covenant, which was of major importance for the regulation of the craft in the city. In 1755 he was a guarantor for another goldsmith, Domingos Sousa Coelho, and he worked on the silver altarpiece (in situ) of Oporto Cathedral. This altarpiece was designed by the architect Nicolau Nasoni, whose work greatly influenced Sampaio. He also worked for the church of Clérigos from 1756 and for the church of S Ildefonso between 1760 and 1781. He was considered one of the best silversmiths in Oporto, being elected a judge of the goldsmiths’ guild in ...

(b Piano del Cilento, Salerno, Feb 9, 1662; d Naples, Jan 26, 1728).

Italian painter and silversmith. He was important to the history of painting in Naples in the transitional period between the 17th and 18th centuries. His elegant art encouraged the movement away from Baroque drama towards a more tender, rocaille style in harmony with the earliest manifestations in Naples of the Arcadian school of poetry and of the Enlightenment. He painted frescoes, altarpieces and allegorical and mythological pictures.

He arrived in Naples while still young and received his first artistic training in the workshop of Luca Giordano. He was in Rome before 1683, where he was the pupil of Giovanni Maria Morandi (1622–1717), a still-life painter, and here he became a protégé of the 7th Marqués del Carpio, Gaspar de Haro y Guzmán, the Spanish Ambassador, who had already begun to form an impressive art collection. In Rome the influence of Giordano was modified by the formal elegance of the painting of Carlo Maratti. De Matteis’s earliest known work, the ...

Polish family of goldsmiths. Nathaniel Schlaubitz (b Elbląg, 2 March 1662; d Gdańsk, 5 Dec 1726) was apprenticed to Benedykt Clausen and made a freeman of the guild in 1690. After attaining his master’s status and citizenship in Gdańsk, he stayed there for the rest of his life, serving in both the guild and municipal administrations. Of his identified works, including monstrances in Walichnowo and Wielki Garc and a chalice in Lignowo, the most outstanding is a tankard (Gdańsk, N. Mus.), decorated with scenes in high relief of the passing of the Israelites through the Red Sea. He belongs to the generation of Baroque goldsmiths whose work is characterized by dynamic, plastic forms and the use of repoussé work. Of his three sons Benjamin Schlaubitz, Nathaniel Schlaubitz the younger and Jan Gotfryd Schlaubitz, the two eldest died at an early age. Jan Gotfryd Schlaubitz (b Gdańsk, 29 May 1707...

[János]

(b Kassa, Upper Hungary [now Košice, Slovakia], before 1728; d Lőcse, Upper Hungary [now Levoča, Slovakia], May 6, 1782).

Hungarian goldsmith. He was a prominent master goldsmith and worked in the late Baroque and Rococo styles. In 1729 he was made a master of the goldsmiths’ guild of Lőcse and until his death was First Guild Master. He decorated his works with figural and landscape scenes, perfected the technique of enamelling on copper and used gem- and hardstones on his monstrances. As well as his initials ...