…Francesco Raimondi è riuscito a trasfigurare l’eredità storica del territorio in un lessico personale ed inconfondibile, dirompente ed inedito: un linguaggio in grado di coniugare la poesia del folclore alle suggestioni del primitivismo, contemperando stile classico e avanguardia, antico e moderno, tradizione ed attualità.
Ne fa fede la festosa gamma dell’intera sua produzione, versatile e composita. Diversi sono i registri e sempre nuove le modalità esecutive, dalla perspicace ripresa dell’iconografia popolaresca dei modelli in maiolica (fiasche, bacini, lunette, piastrelle), all’ ingegnosa elaborazione di sculture e gruppi plastici in crosta vetrosa (naiadi, eroine, ittiocentauri, iguane, pesci). E poi ancora dalle grandi pitture a soggetto sacro o mondano, mitologico o storicista a quello spericolato filone “concettuale”, improntato ad un astrattismo geometrico, gestuale e vorticoso, scenografico e spettacolare, fra richiami moreschi ed innesti tecnologici, caratterizzato da smalti vivaci e da cristalline cangianti (sculture, steli, pannelli, vasi, maschere).

…Francesco Raimondi has managed to transfigure the historical legacy of the territory into a personal and unmistakable lexicon, disruptive and unprecedented: a language capable of combining the poetry of folklore with the suggestions of primitivism, combining classic and avant-garde style, ancient and modern, tradition and current events.
The festive range of its entire production, versatile and composite, bears witness to this. The registers are different and the methods of execution are always new, from the perceptive revival of the popular iconography of the majolica models (flasks, basins, lunettes, tiles), to the ingenious elaboration of sculptures and plastic groups in vitreous crust (naiads, heroines, ichthyocentaurs, iguanas, fish). And then again from the great paintings with sacred or worldly, mythological or historicist subjects to that reckless “conceptual” trend, marked by a geometric, gestural and swirling, scenographic and spectacular abstractionism, between Moorish references and technological additions, characterized by lively enamels and iridescent crystallines (sculptures, stems, panels, vases, masks).

…Even if each work is dedicated to a character or a completed story, to a closed and separate topic, it seems clear that each of them is nothing more than a single passage of a single narrative. No detail, not even the slightest veil is repeated identically elsewhere, yet one has the impression that everything returns, in an uninterrupted flow that proceeds without interruption, in a game that is always the same and always varied. We have therefore ended up in the middle of some ancient history, but it is also true that among many classical references we also find ourselves among completely contemporary mythological creatures: cars, planes, televisions, telephones, and even toilets… inside this tale of shiny and velvety majolica, suddenly we find ourselves face to face with the artist himself, Francesco Raimondi from Vietri sul Mare, master majolica maker and refined painter, vigorous sculptor and skilled ornamentalist, but also the dreaming Satyr, Nepthur and many other things…

Raimondesche