Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Bartolozzi, Gaetano Stefano

1117969Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 03 — Bartolozzi, Gaetano Stefano1885Robert Edmund Graves

BARTOLOZZI, GAETANO STEFANO (1757–1821), engraver, the son of Francesco Bartolozzi [q. v.], was born in Rome in 1757, and inherited some of his father's talent, but his indolent disposition and Bohemian proclivities eventually marred his life. He was passionately fond of music, to which he devoted most of his time, to the neglect of his business as a printseller, so that he became involved in difficulties, and was obliged to sell his stock of prints, drawings, and copperplates, by auction at Christie's in 1797. He then went to Paris and opened a musical and fencing academy, which enabled him for some years to maintain a good position; but he afterwards drifted into poverty. His engravings are but few in number; they comprise portraits of Madame Récamier, after Cosway, and of Mrs. Rudd, who was tried for forgery in 1775, as well as six plates for the ‘British Gallery of Contemporary Portraits,’ 1822, and a study of a nude female figure, from a drawing by Annibale Carracci, for Ottley's ‘Italian School of Design.’ He died in London on 25 Aug. 1821. Madame Vestris, the celebrated comic actress, was his daughter.

[Redgrave's Dictionary of Artists, 1878; Tuer's Bartolozzi and his Works, 1882, i. 22–25.]

R. E. G.