Biography

Franco de' Russi (also Rossi, or Francesco di Giovanni de Russi), Italian illuminator born in Mantua. He was possibly a pupil of Guglielmo Giraldi in Ferrara. He is first recorded in a contract for the immense and extensively decorated Bible of Borso d'Este, which was completed between 1455 and 1461. In the early 1460s he may have left Ferrara and gone to Veneto, where there is mention of him in 1471 or 1472. At that time he was influenced by Andrea Mantegna.

In the early 1470s he moved to Urbino. He was probably also called upon as one of the miniaturists for a copy of Dante's Divine Comedy which was produced for Federico da Montefeltro between 1474 and 1482.