The "gold background" in the works of contemporary Italian artists: Renata Boero, Paolo Canevari, Valerio D'Angelo, Gianni Dessì, Rä di Martino, Flavio Favelli, Sabina Mirri, Elisa Montessori, Luigi Ontani and Alfredo Pirri.

The "gold background" figuration, a technique of which there are traces since the early Christian and Byzantine era, has never ceased to attract artists, influencing their practices and stimulating new interpretations up to reaching contemporaneity. “El Dorado” offers a reflection on the persistence of this fascination through the works of all Italian artists, but different in terms of research and generation. The works - some of which were created specifically for the occasion - are a testimony to the relevance of the "gold fund" and underline the importance of anchoring to history in contemporary research.

The exhibition itinerary is not limited to didacticly investigating the technical aspects of the "gold background", it is rather aimed at exploring its origins from a historical and theoretical perspective to the point of highlighting its more mystical contents linked to its quality of light and abstraction and his ability to achieve a figuration of absolute and timeless space.

The exhibition develops not only in the rooms that host the collection, but also in the more intimate spaces of the Pietro Canonica Museum , a rare museum example of an artist's house located in the greenery of Villa Borghese where the works dialogue with the environments of the Fortezzuola, residence and atelier of the Italian sculptor from 1927 until his death in 1959.

The Roccantica Study Center, after having produced the exhibition La Vita Nova. Love in Dante in the gaze of 10 female artists curated by Alessandra Mammì (Museo Barracco – Rome, June-October 2021), thus offers a new exhibition project dedicated to contemporary art by interacting with a venue of the Roman museum heritage.