Arianna Bettarelli
Agitated-Agitating: perhaps a fitting paradigm for those who posi- tion themselves for action by instilling uncomfortable questions— inviting action—without suggesting or confirming answers. Moro- ni’s work offers itself and is directed entirely toward the viewer’s conscience, in the full totality of its form and content, while re- maining partially impenetrable and enigmatic. It unsettles the ambitious, gratifies the hindered, forcing both into a face-to-faceconfrontation with themselves. In a sense, almost as if commit- ting an act of violence, the artist disappears behind their own di- rection, taking a seat in the audience and pushing the actor to the extremes of the possible and impossible. Metaphor aside, Moroni is relentless in presenting opposing elements that initially emer- ge as binaries, only to branch further into complex multiplicities. Between these extremes, the work plunges into the abyss of the distance separating them, into the impossibility of reconciliation. Those who seem to hold the key return defeated, for they merely multiply possibilities, rendering them null. The relentless advan- ces, the analytical retreats, and yet both, lost, find themselvesdrawn back to the form. This form, deceptively clear, is constructed of elements that simulate each other: organic and inorganic, sa- cred and profane, high and low, dogmatic and scientific, private and public. The eye investigates feverishly, but the solution ne- ver arrives: if anyone can place their truth in the tabernacle, then everything—or nothing—is possible. Here one finds an affinity with certain theatrical practices of the absurd. On one hand, the viola- tion of personal beliefs pushes one to reaffirm them; on the other, the illusion of truth constructs an anti-narrative, wittily directed to expose the quintessentially human dynamics of grappling with existence. Thus, those who proudly cling to a dogmatic attitude will fall into the trap of resolution; conversely, the undecided dreamer will sink further into doubt. Referencing Agamben’s The Man Without Content, one discovers in Moroni’s work “the spectator” who “sees in the work of art, themselves as Other, their being-for-themselves as being-outside-themselves (...).” And yet, beyond the uncanny self-recognition as an “I in the form of absolu- te estrangement,” which “possesses itself only within this rupture,”
Moroni’s provocation compels one to be “called out” to affirm and contradict themselves, further multiplying the rupture.Between scientific assertions and dogma, existence is perpe- tually questioned: the outcomes evoke a sense of hindrance,ironically disguised as fluidity—or vice versa. Moroni navigates the fine line between disorienting irony and unsettling truths— never singular, at times vibrant, at times obliterated. The work operates at extremes, in conglomerates of matter, ruins, and vanishings within the presence of memory. Moroni often tran- sforms us into inept beings, inducing a state of paralyzed dislo- cation—even within the “place.” Like the Good in Mayakovsky’s Loved Myself, through gurgles, jolts, and clarifications, yet always with a fixed gaze, Moroni’s production, seemingly brutal in tone,material, and concept, is draped in elegant velvet: a poetic act.
Mario Consiglio
Moroni is a free, multimedia artist, capable of expressing himself in any language. Remarkable is this latest material production with textile processing where he conceptualizes painting and sculpture, bravely distinguishing himself from current Italian trends by undertaking a research that on the one hand looks at our post-war tradition of Manzoni, Castellani, Burri and Bonalumi and on the other at the most current international neo-abstractio- nist painting trends such as Bosco Sodi, Sterling Ruby and other post-vandalist artists.
Moroni’s works are tragically elegant. The alchemy of how he wor- ks with matter brings us back to the primordial nature of rocks, the organic ephemerality of flesh and a macro vision of the invisible.