Democrito Bernardo Bitti SJ (1548-1610)

• Was an Italian Jesuit priest and painter.
• Democrito Bernardo Bitti was born in Camerino, Italy in 1548.
• He became a painter at an early age and as a teenager he moved to Rome to study painting.
• His studies focused on Italian Mannerism.
• At the age of 20, in 1568, Bitti became a Jesuit and relocated to the novitiate of Sant'Andrea al Quirinale, also in Rome, where he stayed until 1573.
• Bitti was commissioned on a Jesuit mission to Peru in 1571.
• Becoming the first artist to travel on a Jesuit mission to South America.
• The expedition party traveled through Spain on their way to Peru.
• The Jesuit party arrived in Peru in 1575, where Bitti introduced Mannerism to the country.
• In 1583, Bitti moved to Cusco, where he stayed until the end of 1584. 
• Bitti returned to Lima and continued to work there until his death in 1610.
• Bitti is considered the founder of the Cusco School of painting.
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