Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione

Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione was an Italian Baroque painter, printmaker and draftsman of the Genoese school. He is best known for his etchings and for inventing the printmaking technique of monotyping.

He painted portraits, history paintings and landscapes, but specialized in rural scenes with more animals than human figures. He was also known for oil sketches as finished works, repeated subjects in new compositions, and a series of etchings and monotypes that included religious, moral, and exotic heads.

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• Was an Italian Baroque painter, printmaker, and draftsman associated with the Genoese school.
• Became best known for etchings and for having invented monotyping.
• Painted portraits, history paintings, and landscapes, but came to focus on rural scenes with more animals than human figures.
• Noah’s Ark and the animals entering the ark were a favorite theme, and he created new subjects from the first parts of the Old Testament.
• Lived in Genoa, Rome, Florence, Naples, and Mantua, where he worked as a court artist for Duke Carlo II and Isabella Chiara of Austria.
• Developed oil sketch painting as finished work and returned to the same subjects many times, in paintings and prints, with different compositions.
• Produced about sixty prints; among the best known are The Genius of Castiglione, Diogenes searching for a Man, and scenes on religious and moral themes.
• His prints stand out for their use of light and shadow and earned him the name of a second Rembrandt.
• Painted animals frequently and used still-life elements and animals in religious and mythological compositions.
• His works are in Rome, Venice, Naples, Florence, Genoa, and Mantua, and The Presepio is among his most celebrated paintings.