The development of Painting from the era of cave graffiti to Post-War art has established a great tradition. Painting constitutes the central element of a moltitude of forms of expressions, making up the visual arts. Confronted by such a tradition, contemporary artists are bound to experience profound embarassment. Nevertheless there are some who, fortunately, dare to interact with and confront the long series of solutions resolved by numerous masters. Those who have menaged both to overcome the anguish of being derivative and the obsession with novelty, may choose to operate at peace whithin the tradition of the new while trying to find their own identity by defining those elements of distinction that make their work unique.

This is the case with Letizia Galli and what follows stylistically from her natural disposition towards Painting. The singularity of Letizia Galli's way of painting derives from it being applied with the assistance of a dropper. Thus described, the technique may not at first appear to make a lot of sense but I will try now to explain what it is that makes the work so particularly interesting. Usually a painting by this artist is made of irregular circular forms, which break the uniformity of the surface. These forms look like flashes of light in the dark, sometimes these appeare to look like trasparent drops. They may also remind one of natural organisms observed through the microscope, belonging both to the vegetal and the animal world. In some paintings, the chromatic contrasts produce images of a psychedelic character.

The works are naturally intended to be viewed vertically, but they are prepared in the horizontal plane. The artist works from above, choosing and controlling the drip of coloured droplets. Once they touch the surface, these drops are repelled or interpenetrated, gathered together or expanded. Such effects can be controlled to a certain degree. The outcome and the configuration of the image is an act of discovery even to the author herself. When satisfactory formal results are obtained, then repetition plays its role.

Over the series of works, wonder gives away to the application of procedures. Nevertheless the resulting solutions are not mere cause-affect correlations: the outcome is always slightly out of control. Such procedural rigour, which allows the presence and the exploitation of casual factors, has nothing to do with the rigid rationalism of so much historical and more recent abstract painting. The work is successful when it surprises, thanks to unespected outcomes which paradoxically derive from the application of a method - an open method. The theory underlying Galli's work may be compared to post Darwinian knowledge, to non-deterministic ways of thinking.

By dripping the painting medium the artist combines a desire to measure the image while at the same time allowing the unforeseen to occur. In this way pure fortuitous chance enriches the work. In addition to direction and choice, Galli's paintings show an acceptance of the unknown variable. When it reveals itself by generating satisfactory forms, it provokes amazement as unexpected effects happen. This is the same amazement we experience as spectators.