CLOVIO, GIULIO. - Miniaturist, b. at Grizane in Croatia, d. at Rome on 5 Jan. 1578. His name in his native language was Jurai (that is, George) Glovichsich. In 1516 he was in Venice with the Grimani family, then he was in Rome, where he met Giulio Romano. In 1524 he was in Hungary and was working for King Louis II. In 1527 he was again in Rome and during the sack he was taken prisoner by the Spaniards. Having fled, he took refuge in Mantua, where he became a canon scopetino in the convent of S. Rufina, assuming the name Giulio. But his former patron, Cardinal Marino Grimani, obtained (1531) that he be released from his vows and go to work for him in Perugia. He was then in Rome at the court of Cardinal Alessandro Farnese, departing only for certain important works such as those executed in 1551 for Cosimo de' Medici in Florence.
The works of C. remembered by Vasari, and those assigned to him, are very numerous; among these should be remembered, besides a deposition and a self-portrait in the Pitti gallery in Florence, certain codices of the Vatican library, among them the missals nos. 3805 and 3807; the Canon Missae of the archiepiscopal archive of Ravenna; the Silius Italicus of the Marciana in Venice, the Commentaries on the Epistle of St. Paul in the Soane Museum and other manuscripts in the British Museum in London, the Psalter of Paul III in Paris, etc.
The fame of d. G. C., as an exceptional artist, was in his time immense, and certainly his abilities as a technician and draughtsman appear even now truly extraordinary. Nevertheless the judgment expressed of him today is limited to the interest that one who attempts to translate into patient minutiae of a somewhat Flemish taste the closed harmony of Raphael's forms or the power of Michelangelo's can arouse; and our admiration is therefore limited to his, at times miraculous, craftsmanship.
Bibliography2 works
Emilio Lavagnino