The Poet and the Artists: Davide Rondoni and the Visions of Omar Galliani

The dialogue between word and image has never been a mere encounter; it is a suspended terrain, where time, light, and consciousness converge in subtle resonance. In Fano, Omar Galliani’s solo exhibition, “Concordi lumine maior. In poetry and painting”, opens a portal onto this delicate territory, a space where painting breathes with poetry, and poetry attunes itself to the rhythms of the visual. Hosted until November 30th across Palazzo Bracci Pagani and the Pinacoteca San Domenico, the exhibition transcends the purely visual: it is experience, encounter, and meditation, an interweaving of gazes, gestures, and silences.

At the heart of the project, the inauguration staged a pivotal dialogue between Davide Rondoni and Galliani, before a monumental installation traversing the nave of the church. Here, painting becomes word, and poetry assumes tangible presence, folding into the space as though it were pigment on canvas. Galliani’s work, always poised between the corporeal and the transcendent, negotiates the boundaries of perception: his figures are vessels of memory and imagination, of intimate history and universal archetype. Rondoni’s poetry, echoing the lyric intensity of Alda Merini, Giuseppe Conte, Seamus Heaney, Roberto Mussapi, Guido Oldani, and Maurizio Cucchi, resonates with the same pursuit of revelation, drawing the reader into the inner rhythm of Galliani’s visions.

In the first poem, Rondoni contemplates Galliani’s female figures: “They never smile, lost or perhaps travelers of their inner and future Quattrocento.” Each face becomes a universe suspended in time, each gaze a luminous secret. These figures speak a language of “secret obedience”, demanding an attentiveness that is almost ritual, inviting the viewer to read the subtle hieroglyphs of emotion and form. The silence they carry is not absence but depth; it is the weight of centuries, the persistence of light, the enduring dialogue between presence and absence.

The second poem, from Rispondimi, bellezza (Pellegrini Editore, 2023), extends this conversation into the domain of human vulnerability and desire, exploring the threshold where the heart confronts beauty and the invisible: “At the height of my heart I have a wound / it cries inside, with a smile, life.” Here, poetry and painting do not merely coexist; they enter into a reflective, almost alchemical exchange. The brushstroke illuminates the verse, the verse animates the line; the two mediums become mirrors of contemplation, empathy, and vitality. They remind us that the encounter with art is both intimate and expansive, capable of revealing the unspoken architecture of our interior lives.

Through its monumental installations and Rondoni’s luminous verses, “Concordi lumine maior” constructs more than an exhibition: it erects a poetic-visual laboratory, a suspended interstice where light and word, figure and metaphor, time and memory merge. Each visit becomes a journey, a pilgrimage through visions that archive the past while illuminating the present. In this space, seeing and feeling are inseparable, and art manifests in its most complete, integrative form—a dialogue between soul and perception, where the act of looking itself becomes a form of listening.

In essence, the exhibition offers a meditation on the luminous potential of human expression: a reminder that painting and poetry, in their convergence, can articulate what is otherwise ineffable. It is an invitation to dwell within light, to listen to silence, and to experience art as both an intimate revelation and a communal awakening.

Davide Rondoni con l’artista Omar Galliani

Il poeta Davide Rondoni torna con la sua rubrica per ArtsLife con due liriche dedicate alle figure e agli sguardi di Omar Galliani

Lo spunto viene dalla grande mostra personale che Fano dedica a Omar Galliani, titolo “Concordi lumine maior. In poesia e pittura”. Ospitata fino al 30 novembre nella doppia sede di Palazzo Bracci Pagani e della Pinacoteca San Domenico. In occasione dell’inaugurazione, si è svolto un dialogo tra l’artista e il poeta Davide Rondoni, davanti a un’installazione monumentale che attraversa la navata della chiesa. Cuore del progetto è infatti il dialogo tra pittura e poesia, da sempre al centro della ricerca dell’artista. Con opere accompagnate da testi poetici di autori quali Alda Merini, Giuseppe Conte, Seamus Heaney, Roberto Mussapi, Guido Oldani, Maurizio Cucchi, oltre allo stesso Rondoni. Che qui ne propone alcuni passi…

Suite per Omar Galliani

I
Non sorridono mai

Non sorridono mai, perse o forse
viaggiatrici
di un loro interiore
e futuro Quattrocento, nell’inquieto
mutamento tra il cielo e il cuore
migrazioni di sguardi, visi di donne nelle mani
di un pittore –

non perdono mai la luce,
la trattengono da ogni possibile
fulgore,

niente sorriso, niente lampo
nell’indeciso velarsi delle ore
e nei movimenti delle stelle.

Non cercano mai altro da quello
che sono, figure
di figure, parlano una lingua
di segreta obbedienza, e una alta,
sfuggente, sentenza le tiene –

quale bene, Omar delle visioni, quale
bene….

***

II
Quel che un uomo può dire a una donna o al cielo
Per le opere al museo Poldi Pezzoli

I
Non ridarmi più indietro
quel che mi hai rubato, la luce ultima,
la quiete, via via
l’albero esploso della mente

non ridarmi niente
della volta notturna di Roma, della luna
caduta nel brutto piazzale

nel gesto fatale di aprire le braccia
al consumo del vento
a tutto l’amore che
mi fa infelice e contento

non ridarmi più quel che mi hai
strappato, vedi:
all’altezza del cuore ho una ferita
ci grida dentro, con un sorriso,
la vita

tieniti tutto, dimenticami
tu, interamente,

non ridarmi indietro, meglio
finire in te
che morire me a me solo
sperdutamente

(da Rispondimi, bellezza – pellegrini editore 2023)

© Charlotte Madeleine Castelli | All rights reserved