From the beginning of the 1950s, Birolli spent extended periods of solitude and work in a number of coastal locations: on Isola di Porto Buso, near Grado, in 1951; at Bocca di Magra in 1952; and at Fosso Sejore in 1950, 1953 and 1954.

These periods of “immersion in nature”, genuine “physical trials of imaginative escape”, gave rise to the Taccuini delle Marche and to works marked by a vibrant graphic energy, such as Necropoli etrusca.

During these same years, he took an active part in the debate surrounding Neorealism and wrote a number of polemical essays, including Courbet e il Realismo (1949), Il lavoro nella pittura italiana (1950), and the conference he presented at the Gabinetto Vieusseux in Florence on 19 January 1953.

In 1951, Birolli held his first solo exhibition in New York at the Catherine Viviano Gallery, accompanied by an introductory text by Lionello Venturi. The three solo exhibitions and three group exhibitions that Viviano would subsequently organise around Birolli’s work, including those of 1953, 1956 and 1970, played an important role in bringing his work into American collections.

In 1952, he joined the Gruppo degli Otto, comprising Afro Basaldella, Renato Birolli, Antonio Corpora, Mattia Moreni, Ennio Morlotti, Giuseppe Santomaso, Giulio Turcato and Emilio Vedova. The group was presented by Lionello Venturi at the XXVI Venice Biennale, where Birolli was also given a dedicated gallery.

During the same period, the publisher La Conchiglia issued the volume Italia ’44.

In the spring of 1953, Birolli travelled through Spain before spending the summer at Fosso Sejore, where he completed the Taccuino delle Marche. The following year, he created a large-scale mural decoration for the X Triennale di Milano and participated in the XXVII Venice Biennale.