The work was first seen by the Cerasi couple in 1985 as part of the retrospective dedicated to the master, organized at Palazzo Braschi. The little acrobats represent one of the key works in A. Donghi's production in the context of the new figuration and the Flemish atmospheres evoked here: the influence of Balthus and the timelessness of the representation give the image an underlying ambivalence visible in the gaze crystallized of the two young protagonists.

The artist, of Lithuanian origins, had already been in Rome for some years: a student at the Academy of Fine Arts of the capital, where she met Mario Mafai and Scipione, she had already gained international experience with her studies in Paris and London , dedicated above all to his musical training. As can be seen in this self-portrait, in fact, Raphaël represents herself with the violin, conferring truth and adherence to the real datum, but with a formal approach inspired by Fauvism and in particular by Chagall that accentuates the choice for a fluid and sentimental style.

The large sculpture represents the culmination of a meditation that the artist had been carrying out since the early 1940s. The Great Genesis is the result of a long reflection in which the artist elaborates the main themes that he addressed in all his works : the affections, the nostalgia and the bond between mother and child. The importance of the theme addressed is also evident in the choice of large sizes of the sculpture and the mighty image becomes an emblem of motherhood. The magic of the transforming body and the wonder of this change are evident in the graceful pose of the woman who collects her hair by lifting it upwards, as if to show the beauty of her shapely body.

The Roman artist is part of the group of protagonists of the "return to order" which at the turn of the 20s and 30s characterized the production of a number of artists who mainly work in the capital. For Donghi in particular, we speak of “magical realism”, as Bontempelli intended it: rarefied atmospheres and estranged and immobile figures, intense gazes. Just as the two protagonists in this work intensely observe the viewer, time seems to have stopped.

The large bas-relief made by the Roman artist represents his strong link with the Agro Pontino area where, together with other artists close to the peasant world of the Roman countryside, he often went to document, through sculpture, that bucolic and uncontaminated world. which the artist promoted. The subject represents galloping horses that the artist evokes through a slight contour line, paying greater attention to the movement and speed of the action.