Natale Bonifacio

Natale Bonifacio de Sebenico (1537/38, in Sebenico – 23 February 1592, Sebenico) was a Venetian producer of engravings and woodcuts in Rome, where he lived and worked for most of his life. His plates are principally etchings. In 1590, he engraved for a book composed by Domenico Fontana, architect to Pope Sixtus V, concerning the laborious engineering of the moving and erection of the Vatican obelisk.



Life
Bonifacio was born in Sebenico (modern-day Šibenik, Croatia) to his father Jerome, a native of the noble family of Capua. Very little is known of the early years of his life. In the 1570s, he is documented as traveling to Venice, where he published some maps. From there, in 1575 - in conjunction with the opening of the Holy Year - he moved to Rome. Over the next few years, his fame and popularity grew.

On 5 July 1579, Bonifacio was received into the congregation of Saint Jerome of the Croats (degli Schiavoni), becoming the guardian on 10 April 1580, a mayor auditor in 1582, and a chamberlain in 1583. The next year - due to some errors in the compilation of the accounts - he was forced to repay the damage affecting copper by Christmas of 1586 of two images of St. Jerome for the candles to be offered to the pope on the feast of Candlemas. In 1589, Boniface was second guardian of the Brotherhood, when he had to go back to Sebenico to assist his sick mother, leaving his wife Maddalena in Rome with their children. In 1590, he engraved for a book composed by Domenico Fontana, architect to Pope Sixtus V, concerning the laborious engineering of the moving and erection of the Vatican obelisk. He died on 23 February 1592.

Exhibitions
From March to April 2003, an exhibition in the Print Department of the Croatian Academy of Arts and Sciences in Zagreb focused on works by Bonifacio and by another native of Sebenico, Martino Rota, held in Croatian collections.