After the recent rich and authoritative anthological shows held this year (first in Madrid and then in Bassano del Grappa), the city of Riccione has promoted, in collaboration with The William G. Congdon Foundation, an exhibition on a single theme, perhaps the first of its kind, that brings into focus a specific moment, limited in time, in the vast, multi-faceted work of this American artist: his representations of the landscape of the Adriatic Riviera in Romagna, where for more than ten years, between 1980 and 1993, he spent the summer months. The show is entitled, "The Sea is a Long Blue Line. Rimini and Riccione in the Work of William Congdon-Paintings, Pastels, and Drawings-1980-1993." The exhibition, which has brought together for the first time oils and pastels, has thus opened a window onto a hitherto unexplored aspect of his later production. At the same time it is a "posthumous" act of affectionate homage paid by Congdon to the places and persons whose hospitality he enjoyed in the years when he had to fight the ills of old age, as well as to the Adriatic shore where, up to the last, he was able to immerse himself in the sea, an element so intrinsic to his sensibility as an artist. In a word, it is a show aimed above all at the inhabitants of the Riviera, but one that nonetheless offers a valuable contribution to the knowledge and understanding of an artist whose fatherland was the whole world and whose work is destined to touch the hearts and minds of all mankind.