«Laura Omacini is a sunny and delicate artist, like her art». Sara Sartori, newly appointed municipal councilor in Montecchio Emilia (RE) with responsibility for Culture, introduces me to the visit with these words as we wander through the well-lit and well-arranged rooms of Casa Cavezzi. Laura Omacini is the winner of the fourth edition of the “Massimiliano Galliani Prize for drawing under 40”, an annual event that the ArtVerona art fair and the artMacs cultural association of Montecchio, created by the specific will of the Galliani family in memory of Massimiliano, also an artist who died at the age of 37, organize together with the Municipality of Montecchio to honor the memory of the artist from Montecchio.
Laura Omacini, “Correzioni”, 2025, grafite su carta, 60 x 40 cm, courtesy of the artist
Thanks to a perfect installation curated by the artist and the Municipality, eight recent works of graphite on paper by the artist, born in 1991 and native of Venice, flow by. With no visible captions, an effective choice, the immersion into the infinite nuances of whites and blacks in Omacini’s works is total and the interaction is «harmonious, soft and accompanied by reflections that oscillate between stability and evanescence» (Sara Sartori dixit). The project that links Laura Omacini’s works is titled “Correzioni” (the z in red is the artist’s poetic license) and takes up, declining it in the plural, the title of the eponymous novel by Thomas Bernhard, set in a place also made of invincible silences. The combination of exhibition space and drawings hanging on the walls indeed transmits an engaging silence and a peaceful slowness in observing, but the reference to correction is evident in the expressive form we are observing: «where error is the fruit of an instant, correction is a longer process» (Laura Omacini) and more articulated.
Laura Omacini, “Congiungimenti”, 2023, collage, pastello, acrilico e olio su tela, 130 x 80 cm; “Diktat IV”, 2024, collage, pastello, acrilico e olio su tela, 130 x 80 cm, courtesy of the artist
Visiting the exhibition, we could also feel the living magnetism that Laura Omacini’s work is capable of transmitting both in small and in more significant dimensions. The work chosen as the cover of “Correzioni” (2025), which bears the title of the entire exhibition, is also the largest and stands out for a superb nebula of graphite signs on paper. Thanks to this remarkable drawing we understand that this art form, in its significant declinations, has a freshness and expressive vivacity. The motivation behind the award recalls the ancient tradition of this expressive form, but also exalts its contemporary projections. Laura Omacini’s greatest merit, in drawing, is the ability to transcend visual detail. This is the impression one has, for example, observing “Portrait I” (2024), a sort of double atomic mushroom that, despite its reduced dimensions (just 152 mm in height by 250 mm in base), takes shape upward with very powerful effect.
Laura Omacini, “Portrait V”, 2024, grafite su carta, 12 x 16,3 cm, courtesy of the artist
In “Portrait III” and “Portrait II” (2024) the visual illusion reaches a higher level: these are building scaffoldings, yet other images emerge before our eyes that the brain recognizes by attributing them to other contexts (like the human body, for example) and that can also serve as an ideal escape route or personal focal center for the observer. Completing the exhibition in the larger hall are “Portrait VIII” (2024) in which a familiar yet enigmatic object appears to us in the center of the scene, looming over our daily life almost like a warning, and “Congiungimenti I” (2023), in which the inspiration from a facade under renovation is very clear, but the artist returns it to us with superb perspective depth and a set of intertwined lines that give a pleasantly hyper-rational spatiality. In the other exhibition room, the smaller one, there are two works displayed beyond the most representative drawing and cover of the exhibition. Even in this case, Laura Omacini uses the word portrait in the titling and one remains pleasantly agitated in associating such a figurative artistic term with a thematic project that takes inspiration from urban scaffolding. But, after all, what are scaffoldings and the work they represent, if not corrections to be made to a building that evidently needs repair interventions?
Laura Omacini, “Portrait II”, 2024, grafite su carta, 12 x 15 cm, courtesy of the artist
In “Portrait IX” and “Portrait X” (2025) the building structure is easily recognizable, especially in the ninth drawing. But it seems wrapped in an impossible nebula in this context, which sharpens our will to look, scrutinize, go in search of detail in an infinite enclosed in eight and a half centimeters in height by little more than a centimeter in base. In the tenth act of the series titled to the portrait, this contrasting duality between form and what form reveals internally is strongly confirmed, between abstraction of vision and invisible human presence (because there are no human figures) but imaginable, because the correction of a building can only reside in the hands of a human being. Finally, we note two technical pieces of information of great value. The jury of the IV edition of the “Massimiliano Galliani Prize for drawing under 40”, which expressed the aforementioned motivation, is composed of Omar Galliani, Elena Pontiggia, Nicola Verlato, Daniela Ferrari from MART and Fausto Torelli, mayor of Montecchio Emilia, and Laura Omacini’s candidacy for the prize was advanced by the Venetian gallery Marignana Arte. Moreover, the exhibition is accompanied by the eponymous catalogue that also includes precious critical contributions.
Info:
Laura Omacini. Correzioni
24/05/2025 – 22/06/2025
Casa Cavezzi
Via Vittorio Veneto, 29
Montecchio Emilia (RE)
www.comune.montecchio-emilia.re.it
I am Giovanni Crotti, born in 1968, and I feel obliged to thank writing because it drives my life. I cultivate within me multitudes that lead me to investigate, know, and deepen every cultural and creative expression, and then write about it, always trying to be clear and documented in the contents.
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