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Castiglione.
Italian family of artists. (1) Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione was one of the greatest and most influential Genoese artists of the mid-17th century. (2) Salvatore Castiglione, his brother, acted as his secretary and produced some etchings, while his son (3) Giovanni Francesco Castiglione imitated his style in rustic and bucolic scenes. Castiglione is documented in the studio of Giovanni Battista Paggi from 1626 until May 1627 and through him became aware of the wide variety of styles then current in Genoa, which included late Mannerism, early Baroque classicism, Flemish naturalism and an indigenous Genoese realism. Through Paggi’s library and collection of prints, Castiglione was introduced to the work of many Italian and northern European printmakers, and he later found the motifs and compositions from a vast body of Italian prints an almost endless source of material for his own works. His eclecticism would have been influenced by theoretical discussions with Paggi, and his art underwent numerous stylistic mutations throughout his career. While it is not certain, as the early biographies suggest, that he also studied with Giovanni Andrea de’ Ferrari, Anthony van Dyck (Soprani, p. 223) and Sinibaldo Scorza (Pio), he was influenced by each of them. He may have begun to create dry-brush oil sketches on paper, perhaps inspired by the oil sketches of Rubens and van Dyck, as early as the late 1620s. No documented works from these formative years are known, yet his later art reveals his interest in the animal-filled landscapes of Scorza and Jan Roos (1591–1638), and in the Bassano family’s earthy biblical scenes. His interest in landscape may reflect an early knowledge of the art of Agostino Tassi and Goffredo Wals, both of whom had worked in Genoa. The following members have entries:
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