The exhibition A Homage to Walt Whitman 1892-1992, opened in Milan, January 1992, at the USIS (United States Information Service) and marked the beginning of a year of celebrations for the centenary of the great American poet’s death. In March, the exhibition  opened in the United States, at The University of Iowa during the Walt Whitman International Conference, in July at the United Nations, New York, N.Y., in October at Brown University, providence, R.I. and California State University, Fresno, Ca.
The drawings are done in pencil, lithographic pencil and Indian ink.

Walt Whitman
All Walt Whitman's poetry is a sustained and earnest effort to say one word: America. He experiments in this undertaking in a variety of ways, but always in a loud, clear voice. Whitman's poetry is wide-ranging, vast, full-bodied and expansive. He is a prophet of the sacredness and true essence of all things. And all these things are contained, as in catalogue, in the geography and history of the American continent, because all that which is American is also cosmic, according to Whitman: it is human, and knows no bounds. All that which is American exists because it was accepted for what it is: it has a language all of its own, and through that language, it works its own magic.
Like Adam in New World, Whitman was the first -midway through the last century - to name things as if he were seeing them for the first time. He put into words the American experience without paying any heed to the sensitivity of the Old World. In a consciously barbarian tone, he pronounced the words of a new, democratic Testament - a new fresh start after the old dictates of the Scriptures and the Constitution.
The guiding principle which Whitman's mind followed in this undertaking was a movement from one point in reality (and each time it was the heart of reality because it represented a lived experience and vision, and was not abstract) to the limits of that ideal circumference which is the line of the horizon. And from each point of that horizon there was further movement towards an infinite number of other horizons. And then beyond that again. And all that Whitman saw with his eye, and his mind's eye, he made his. It became the object of his passion.
Whitman's verse almost never obeys any recognized rules or prosody which might restrict or even exclude the use of one word rather than another for reasons of harmony. But he obeys a rhythm, an expressive form which is able to embrace and incorporate any word or turn of phrase. The entire vocabulary of language is, ideally, for Whitman, a small memorandum. But all these words are only the shadow of a reality which seeks expression in a book - but which does not constitute the book: "this is no book,/Who touches this touches a man".
The ambition that Whitman realized was that of creating a character - his own, the American bard - which gave voice with great vibrancy to the deep but confused convictions of the average man.
His brilliance lies in this alone: in replacing critical reasoning with the motives for one's own vitality. Nevertheless we know very little about this character, this "ego" which is the measure of the world, because it is an "ego" which unfolds in the world, but makes no interior journeys. It is a character, but not a person, and his interior life is a subject which is not touched on. That "ego" is the key to the world, but it is elusive. It is an utter and dazzling certainty which acts as a starting point, but which is not itself explored. It is a vehicle - a space ship - which we must board in order to see what he has seen with his eye or with his mind's eye.
As J.L. Borges has commented, it is pointless to try and understand the nature of the relationship between the facts of Whitman's life and the visions embodied in his Leaves of Grass. It is the immortal character of Whitman who says: "this is no book,/Who touches this touches a man". It is a great literary character, like Ulysses, Hamlet, or Anna Karenina.
The difference lies in the fact that this character - Whitman - is a poet and not a warrior or a prince. But he too, like warriors and princes, would like his works to stay alive in the memory of people, through the celebration of poetry. And this is why he sings of himself. He is a poet singing of a poet, who lives on because he becomes a book. The proof of his subtle literary leger-de-main lies revealed when he recommends reading the book in the open air, where characters feel at their ease, but not readers and men of letters.

Luigi Sampietro, Universita di Milano