In the spring of 1963, Dorazio was in Meeker, Colorado, about to leave for the Southwestern States to discover "prehistoric America". He visits the “Three Graces in the Garden of the Gods” in the Pikes Peak region, not far from Colorado Springs; in early June it reaches the Mesa Verde National Park in the area of ​​the so-called "Cliff Palace", a rock settlement that reached its maximum development around 1270 AD. The postcards sent to Clement Greenberg mark the various stages of the journey which concludes by returning to New York on 20 June and then returning to Italy. The "arts of the Hopi, Zuni and above all Navajo who weave their extraordinary blankets with vegetable colors outdoors" inspire paintings such as Panorama diagonale, in which the weft "widens until it becomes a lacing or interweaving of stripes or bands".

In 1963 Dorazio develops the theme of "chromatic bands", centered on a new network of weaves that generate internal movements of light. Therefore, he elaborates a more updated reflection on the principle of color-light and on the perceptive and symbolic value of colors, which arises from the analysis of works such as the Compenetrazioni iridescenti by Giacomo Balla.

Dorazio played an important role in conveying the knowledge of futurism in the American sphere. He was the author of the review published in 1954 in the magazine "Art News" for the exhibition dedicated to Balla and Severini at the Rose Fried Gallery in New York, which opened with two Compenetrazioni iridescenti by Balla.

The underlying theme of Dorazio's reflections is how to structure the pictorial plot, symmetrically or asymmetrically; evaluate whether to divide the space into fractions and from these fractions create the sensation that the painting goes in or goes out, thus imparting a perceptive dynamism to the whole. If red scans the space, green settles on the bottom; the yellow expands and comes out of the surface, while the white jumps out with arrogance.

Il sole by Giuseppe Pellizza da Volpedo was among the favorite works of the young Dorazio. Also in this case an Italian matrix would have predisposed him, many years later, to color-field painting. The sun, in fact, represents a horizon in a flat field. Its rigorous organization heralds the geometries of Dorazio, while the blaze of light in innumerable shining filaments is also reflected in the cross-hatch effects that multiplied throughout the Sixties in paintings such as Panorama diagonale and numerous related pictorial works.
Why “diagonal”? Because it is the most logical way to represent rays of light emanating from a central source. Also, the average diagonal between verticality and horizontality, thus developing a dynamic character.
(David Anfam, 2023).

In 1963, when Panorama diagonale was executed, Dorazio had just completed the creation of other paintings, including Mano della clemenza, exhibited in 1964 at Documenta III, Kassel and entered in 1965 in the collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York. The purchase by the US museum took place immediately after the Dorazio's personal exhibition at the Marlborough-Gerson Gallery in New York between February and March 1965, in the months in which The Responsive Eye exhibition was underway, organized by William C. Seitz, curator of the MoMA, which after the first stage in New York, between February and April 1965, will continue its tour – with 160 paintings by 99 artists – in four other museums in the States: City Art Museum, St. Louis; Contemporary Arts Council, Seattle, Pasadena Art Museum, Pasadena; Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore.