Giuseppe Zigaina studied at the college in Tolmin (now Slovenia) from 1935 to 1943. In 1942 he exhibited for the first time in Trieste. In 1944 he obtained his artistic maturity in Venice. In 1946 he met Pier Paolo Pasolini in Udine, with whom he established a deep bond of friendship: there were numerous collaborations between the two, as well as Zigaina's publications on Pasolini. In 1948 he was called to participate in the Venice Biennale, where, from 1950 onwards, he was invited numerous times for both collective and individual exhibitions. His personal exhibitions began in 1955, hosted in numerous important Italian cities, such as Milan, Bologna, Florence, and European cities such as Paris, London, Vienna. In 1968 he collaborated on Pasolini's film Teorema and, in the same year, created the sketches for the scenes of Prokofiev's The Gambler for the Rome Opera House. In 1971 he collaborated on the film Decameron by Pier Paolo Pasolini. In 1985 he was Visiting Professor at the Art Institute of San Francisco. In 1981 he was a founding member of the European Triennial of Engraving together with Livio Zanetti, Luigi Zanda, Enzo di Martino and others. In 1990 Pordenone hosted an anthological exhibition including 269 works, of which 14 were completely unpublished from his youthful period. In 1995 he participated in the traveling exhibition L'opera su carta in twenty important Italian galleries; in the same year the large monograph in two volumes was published. In 2000 the Revoltella Museum dedicated a vast anthology to him, with works from 1947 to 1990; he exhibits at the Art Gallery of York University in Toronto. In 2003 he was appointed member of the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich while in 2005 the Museo della Permanente in Milan dedicated the exhibition Zigaina verso la laguna to the artist. In 2009, another large Zigaina anthology, works 1942-2009, opened at Villa Manin in Passariano. In 2011 he was present at the Italian Pavilion of the 54th edition of the Venice Biennale.