The sitter of this profile portrait is identified by the inscription at the bottom as Biagio Arcimboldo, Bernardino Luini's friend and the father of the famous painter Giuseppe Arcimboldo.
Biagio Arcimboldo (active 1518-1554) was also a painter. He is shown as a ripe, bearded man with noble traits, in profile, looking right. While his clothing has only been sketchily represented with rough open strokes, the area of the head is painstakingly worked. The head is set in relief against a blue-black washed ground.
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