Francesco De Grandi Reimagines Santa Rosa Procession in Viterbo

Curator Marcello Carriero commissioned Francesco De Grandi (Palermo, 1968) to create an installation titled 'Vago Fiore' inside the former Church of the Almadiani in Viterbo, as part of the Quartieri dell'arte festival. The work reinterprets the Macchina di Santa Rosa, a thirty-meter-tall tower carrying the statue of the city's patron saint, traditionally paraded on September 3 but canceled in 2020 due to the pandemic. De Grandi produced twelve drawings (100×70 cm) in black pastel and gold, depicting episodes from Saint Rosa's life and miracles, including her exhumation, the baroque machine, two porters ('Facchini di Santa Rosa'), and an assumption scene he compares to a rave. The drawings are displayed on structures around a golden rod, evoking Southern Italian 'vare' (triumphal carts) and a postmodern library. Gian Maria Cervo created a sound carpet blending sacred and profane voices. The project references a 1690 baroque procession and draws on popular accounts of the saint's intact body after a century. De Grandi, known for a secular attitude, engages with the sacred as a source of inspiration, reflecting Giulio Zanchi's idea that secularization transformed spiritual need into a 'sacred without transcendence.'