BISCAINO, Bartolomeo
Italian painter, draughtsman and etcher. His life was cut short by the plague, and little is known about him. He was taught by his father, Giovanni Andrea Biscaino (1605-1657), a mediocre landscape painter, and entered the workshop of Valerio Castello, probably at the end of the 1640s. Biscaino’s early paintings strongly recalled his master’s style, but his forms were softer, his brushstroke broader, and his choice of colours more delicate. Curving draperies and sweetness of expression typified Biscaino’s manner.
The chronology of his oeuvre, truncated by his early death, is hard to reconstruct. Only two paintings bear early documentation: St Ferrando Imploring the Virgin (Genoa, Palazzo Bianco) and an untraced Flaying of Marsyas. Scholars often date Biscaino’s canvases on the basis of his forty catalogued etchings, and he remains best known for his drawings and prints. About half the etchings are signed or initialed, and two are dated. From them it is possible to attribute further works, mostly small canvases, to Biscaino, and to characterize his development.
Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione influenced the iconography and technique of Biscaino’s etchings. In his rendering of animals, figures, and naturalistic settings, and the play of light and shade, Castiglione also provided an important example for Biscaino’s later paintings.
