Born to a family from Lodi in Crema, he studied at the Barnabite College in Moncalieri, then enrolled in the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Pavia, but graduated from the University of Padua. Drawn to art, he practiced engineering only briefly and moved to Milan, where he befriended the painter Stefano Bersani, opening a studio with him.
In addition to painting, he devoted himself to etchings of landscape and architectural subjects. He engraved approximately 650 zinc and copper plates, examples of which are preserved in museums around the world. He exhibited his works, etchings and paintings, in almost all the Biennials of Brera and Venice, but also in Rome, Buenos Aires, Barcelona, Athens and Munich.
Also of notable interest is the work as a photographer that Casanova undertook at the end of the nineteenth century; the artist was one of the first to glimpse the multiple possibilities that the nascent photographic art allowed, even within the figurative arts.