The Olympic Stadium, nestled between the slopes of Monte Mario and the Tiber, offers itself to the eye as something—more than any other—that is ours. A piece of architecture that belongs to us: the customary site of Sunday sports events, with the spectacle of humanity, more than seventy thousand, in transhumance.
Salvatori, a Roman artist who experiences only the urban reality of this functionalist work, has always grasped its power to evoke historical memories and even sentimental experiences. In the painting, which gives the exhibition its title, the artist sought to convey, through the symbolism of sharp blades, all the energy and thunderous din of the stands: the golden rays that fix, focusing on the event of an inexhaustible struggle at the center of the arena.
Three other works complete the Olimpico exhibition: “Arena,” “Derby,” and “I ragazzi d’oro,” the latter a portrait of two teenage soccer players, forever fixed on the panel, almost in an embrace: the truest and most intimate act of any friendship. “Derby” evokes the challenge, competition, and rivalry between the two city teams.
With “Arena,” the artist constructs a refined movement of rippling lines: the elegant geometries of elaborate and skillful schemes, like those deployed by opposing teams. Salvatori’s painting is highly accessible without sacrificing the profound culture that animates it.
“Olimpico” is an exhibition-cum-homage to the reality of a powerful place, approaching the centenary of its foundation (1928), so much lived in yet so little narrated in its potential, even in painting.
The works on display are accompanied by texts by figures with different backgrounds connected to the stadium: Franco (Ciccio) Cordova, a beloved champion; Simona Marchini, wife of a footballer and daughter of the president of Roma in the late 1960s; Marco Lodoli, writer and loyal Lazio fan; Massimo Belli, art critic and curator, timely with his literary tribute to the narrative of works dedicated to such a special place.
The exhibition is hosted at Spazio Opis, which draws on the myth of the goddess Opis, embodying her meaning of fertility and abundance, guardian of the earth’s riches and the creative soul.
