1555 in art

Events

• Villa Giulia is completed, which now houses the National Etruscan Museum's collection of Etruscan art and artifacts

Paintings

Sofonisba Anguissola - The Chess Players (National Museum, Poznań)

• Sofonisba Anguissola - Lucia, Minerva and Europa Anguissola Playing Chess
• Cristofano Gherardi - Transfiguration (Cortona)
• c. 1555-1560 – Illuminated tugra of Sultan Suleyman, from Istambul, Turkey (now in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York)

Births

• April 21 – Lodovico Carracci, Italian painter (died 1619)
• date unknown
  • Carlo Antonio Procaccini, Italian painter of still lifes and landscapes (died unknown)
  • Dong Qichang, Chinese painter, scholar, calligrapher, and art theorist of the later period of the Ming Dynasty (died 1636)
  • Aegidius Sadeler I, Flemish engraver of the Sadeler family (died 1609)
  • Antonio Tempesta, Florentine painter and engraver, worked in Rome, influenced by Counter-Mannerism (died 1630)
  • Giovanni Battista Trotti, Italian painter active mainly in his native city of Cremona (died 1612)
• probable
  • Jacob de Backer, Flemish Mannerist painter and draughtsman (died 1585)

Deaths

• July 2 - Girolamo dai Libri, Italian illuminator of manuscripts and painter of altarpieces (born 1474/1475)
• date unknown
  • Giovanni Antonio Amato, Italian painter (born 1475)
  • Barthel Bruyn the Elder, German painter (born 1493)
  • Niccolò Giolfino, Italian painter (born 1476)
  • Gerolamo Giovenone, Italian painter (born c.1486)
• probable
  • (died 1555/1558): Giovanni Francesco Caroto, Italian painter active in Verona (born 1480)
  • (died 1555/1558): Benedetto Montagna, Italian engraver (born 1481)
  • (died 1555/1561): Heinrich Aldegrever, German painter and engraver (born 1502)
  • Herri met de Bles, Flemish Northern Renaissance and Mannerist landscape painter (born 1510)
  • Jan Mostaert, Dutch painter of portraits and religious subjects (born 1475)
  • Mir Musavvir, Persian illustrator and painter (born unknown)