Moneglia, Liguria, 1527 - El Escorial, Madrid, 1585

Luca Cambiaso was the most celebrated painter of Mannerism* of the Genoese school, and was the inventor of many large-scale fresco* decorations in both palaces and churches in the city. As a draftsman, he is celebrated for having invented a style of figure drawing in which form is simplified into geometric, often cubic, components.

Trained by his father, the mediocre painter Giovanni Cambiaso (1495-1579), from 1544, when he was only seventeen years old, Luca collaborated with him on the decoration of the palace of Antonio Doria. It seems likely that Luca visited Rome in 1547-1550, where his encounter with the work of Michelangelo was to have a decisive impact on his developm...