MORONI, GIADIBATTISTA. (C. 1510-1578), an eminent portrait-painter of the Venetian school, was born at Albino near Bergamo about 1510, and became a pupil of Bonvicino named II Moretto. Beyond the record of his works very few particulars regarding him have reached us. Titian, under whom also Moroni, while still very young, is said to have studied (but this appears hardly probable), had at any rate a high opinion of his powers ; he said that Moroni made his portraits " living " or " actual " (veri). And if the magnates of Bergamo came to the great Venetian for their likenesses he advised them to go to their own countryman. In truthful and animated portraiture Moroni ranks near Titian himself. His portraits do not indeed attain to a majestic monumental character ; but they are full of straightforward life and individuality, with genuine unforced choice of attitude, and excellent texture and arrangement of draperies. There is a certain tendency to a violet tint in the flesh, and the drawing and action of the hands are not first-rate. As leading samples of his portraits may be mentioned - in the Uffizi Gallery, Florence, the Nobleman pointing to a Flame, inscribed "Et quid volo nisi ut ardeat 7" ; in the National Gallery, London, the portraits of a Tailor, a member of the Fenaroli family, Canon Ludovico de' Terzi, and others ; in the Berlin Gallery, his own portrait ; and in Stafford House, the seated half-figure of the Jesuit Ercole Tasso, currently termed "Titian's Schoolmaster " - not as indicating any real connexion between the sitter and Titian, but only the consummate excellence of the work. Besides his portraits, Moroni painted, from youth to his latest days, the ordinary round of sacred compositions ; but in these he falls below his master II Moretto, and his design, which partakes more of the Lombard or Milanese style than of the Venetian, has at times some of the dryness of the quattrocento. One of the best is the Coronation of the Virgin in S. Alessandro della Croce, Bergamo; also in the Cathedral of Verona, Sts Peter and Paul, and in the Brera of Milan, the Assumption of the Virgin. Moroni was engaged upon a Last Judgment in the church of Corlago when he died on 5th February 1578.