Diana Scultori

Diana Scultori (also known as Diana Mantuana and Diana Ghisi; 1547 – 5 April 1612) was an Italian engraver from Mantua, Italy. She is one of the earliest known women printmakers, making mostly reproductive engravings of well-known paintings or drawings, especially those of Raphael and Giulio Romano, or ancient Roman sculptures.

She was one of four children of the sculptor and engraver Giovanni Battista Scultori and the sister of the artist Adamo Scultori, who was many years older. Both of them are often called "Ghisi" from the family's close association with Giorgio Ghisi, a more significant artist, and a misreading of a remark by Vasari. Diana learned the art of engraving from her father, and probably her brother. She was mentioned in the second edition of Giorgio Vasari’s Lives of the Artists (1568).

In 1565, she met her first husband, the architect Francesco da Volterra (Capriani). The pair moved to Rome by 1575. Once in Rome, Diana used her knowledge of business within the art world to advance her husband's career. On 5 June 1575, she received a Papal Privilege to make and market her own work. She used the importance of signature and dedication to her advantage. Three years later (1578) she gave birth to her son Giovanni Battista Capriani. Both Diana symbolically and Francesco actively became members of the Archconfraternity of the Cord of Saint Joseph during their artistic careers. The last known print by Diana dates 1588. After the death of her husband, she remarried another architect, Giulio Pelosi. She died in 1612.

Early life Engraving of Amphion and Zethus Tying Dirce to a Wild Bull -The Farnese Bull, a famous Roman sculpture recently excavated. The cultural changes associated with the Italian Renaissance were providing women greater opportunities to study art, and it became possible for female artists to gain international reputations. The work of Diana Scultori, born in 1547, is a reflection of this changing climate. One of three daughters of the Scultori family, as a woman she was unable to have a formal apprenticeship, but her father taught her his trade. Despite her lack of education in drawing specifically, she was able to use drawings from other artists to learn how to produce engravings.

It was not unusual for the daughters of artisans to be trained in the family craft, but it was considered uncommon for a daughter to be trained in engraving and to make it a career as she did. She received her first public recognition as an engraver in Giorgio Vasari’s second edition of Vites (1568).

After her marriage in 1575 to the aspiring architect Francesco da Volterra, the couple moved to Rome. Here, the focus of her work was reinterpreting works by artists linked to her husband and the papal workshops. Most prints were made to promote and support his career as an architect. She worked within the restrictions encountered by artists of her time, female or otherwise. She used other artists' work as a foundation for her prints, but most of the drawings for her engravings came from either her husband, a family member, including her father, or an artist contemporary with whom she and her husband were acquainted.

Career

On 5 June 1575, the year of her first dated print, Scultori received the Papal Privilege to make and market her own work.

Her astuteness as a businesswoman can be seen not only in her successful application for a papal privilege, but also in her prints that promoted her husband's architectural work. Between 1576 and 1580, she made four prints featuring column capital volutes and other architectural details, including “bead and reel” and “egg and dart” moldings. While she changed her signature over the years, she never signed with the name "Diana Scultori" on any of her prints or documents.

Later life Her last dated print, from 1588, was The Entombment after Paris Nogari. After Francesco da Volterra’s death, she married Giulio Pelosi, another architect, in 1596, who was 20 years her junior. It is unlikely that she made additional prints following 1588, but her reason for stopping is still unknown. She died 24 years later in Rome on 5 April 1612, aged 64 or 65. Several of her engravings continued to be printed after her death.

From 11 October 2025 – 11 January 2026, the Appartamento della Rustica of the Palazzo Ducale in Mantua exhibited Diana Scultori, rare carver: An artist between Mantua and Rome in the sixteenth century. The exhibition features 40 works, including drawings, medals, and engravings on copper and paper.