2018
8 tracks – 39′ 41”
Music for Malls is a soundtrack proposal, an idea of what contemporary music specifically conceived for public spaces, such as shopping centers, could be. Part of it comes from historical concepts of ambient music and Japanese electronic music from the ‘80s, part of it from 24hrs lo-fi hip-hop streams on youtube and commercial jingles.
Presented by Pacto at Croydon Arts Store in the context of the project “It’s Their Thought that Counts”.
2017 – in progress
6 tracks – 13’ 18’’
This work consists in six audio tracks composing my practice statement, recited by my practice itself.
To realize this work, I started off by writing six texts, part of which derives from the appropriation and re-elaboration of fragments, sentences and key-words coming from some of the writings that had been fundamental to the developing of my practice. First and foremost “The Sublime is Now” (1948) by Barnett Newman and “Abstract” (2011) by Liam Gillick, which, in the terms of my research, respectively represent the beginning and end of a certain concept of abstraction.
These texts are then read by a text-to-speech software along with an analog synthesizer background.
If a certain history of abstraction had consisted in a sequence of tentatives aiming at making the work of art autonomous and independent from the artists’ authorship, through this process I’m envisioning a possible, quasi-sci-fi scenario in which the next step had taken place: my work, the research by which it is driven and the aesthetics by which it is generated become a sentient, autonomous, self-aware and completely self-referential entity; the elements that have defined this aesthetics throughout art history (elusiveness, smoothness, sensuality etc.) become the distinctive features of this new entity’s character.
The writings I got inspiration from play, thus, the role of almost archetypical figures in the creation of a new, totally self-referential and artificial setting, absolutely internal to my work’s narrative.
In the following phase, I dedicated myself to the graphic layout necessary to the right transmission of these tracks, designing a specific font and realizing a series of illustrations to outline their surrounding environment, made of minimal shapes and sceneries.
The result of this process consists, then, in different levels, layered on top of each-other, of the same self-feeding and self-legitimising aesthetic, functional exclusively to its own self-referentiality.
This work’s existence is necessary to the contextualization of my practice and vice-versa.
2017
environment
osb, fir wood, spray paint, whiteboard paint.
A set designed to host the activities held by Macao
at Santarcangelo Festival 2017.
The set is made up of three smaller modules, each consisting in one table, two benches and four stools.
For the festival’s opening it was set up as one monolithic block which could take potentially any form, based on the different specific situations in the programme.
Photo credits: Luca Chiaudano.
201 7 installation
spray paint on osb and steel joints 2m high / variable width
Work realized for “Kodomo No Hi” at Sonnenstube, Lugano (CH).
Two do-it-yourslef minimalist sculptures embodying the hope and failure inherent in being a young artist today.
2017 environment
osb, fir slats, hollow bricks.
An apparatus designed to host “Human After All”, a conference held by Hangar Games in collaboration with Kabul magazine at Macao, Milan, featuring Franco “Bifo” Berardi.
This work was born out of a research on the new wave of do-it-yourself, revolving around Youtube tutorials and websites such as Pinterest and Wikihow, and on the current trend that it has set in cafes and all sorts of showrooms of adopting the aesthetics of home-made furniture in order to set an atmosphere of ready-to- use mindfulness and awareness.
2016 site-specific intervention
spray paint on mdf 40cm x 80m ca
Work realized for “Der Blitz 2016 – Arcipelago”, organized in collaboration by MART, Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art of Trento and Rovereto, and MAG, Museo Alto Garda in Riva del Garda, in the Italian province of Trento. The show took place in the castle of Riva del Garda, where MAG is situated.
Since MAG itself is a civic museum, focused mainly on archeology and local history, its audience is not necessarily familiar with contemporary art. The artists invited were, then, solicited to adopt an experiential and environmental approach, considering the unused and in-between spaces in the museum rather than bringing the audience to a frontal, one-to-one fruition.
My intervention consisted in a self-supporting geometric pattern, spray painted on mdf, unfolding throughout all of the perimeter of the castle’s internal balcony, conceived as a temporary, removable wallpainting.
(exhibition view)
2016 sound installation
iPod, shelf, spray painted cable-ducts, speakers. 11’ 31’’ – on loop
Work realized for “Exhibition of the Year 2016” at t-space, Milan.
The concept of this exhibition revolved around Pantone’s “Color of the Year”. For the year 2016, the choice fell on Rose Quartz & Serenity, two for the first time, because of their ability to reassure and embrace the customer seeking mindfulness and well-being in our troubled times, as the statement on the official website said.
My intervention consists in a stereo soundtrack for the exhibition.
This soundtrack is made up of two independent but complementary tracks aiming at the creation of an almost ready- made, ethereal and relaxing background to the other works exhibited. This track is played on loop from an iPod and through two speakers set on the floor, one across from the other in the exhibition space.
The cables are distributed across the walls through cable-ducts, an element often conceived as a disturbance inside of an exhibition. Reflecting on my work’s position as a backdrop, I chose to spray-paint them in two different colors picked from the official “Rose Quartz & Serenity Color Pairings” on Pantone’s website: Luminary Green & Opal Blue. These two colors, in turn, gave their name to the soundtrack itself.
Photo credits: t-space studio (exhibition view)
2016 environment
sound-absorbing floor tiles, digital print on synthetic silk, laminated wood and fir slats, urethane coating on foam rubber, iPod, speakers 31’05’’ – on loop
Solo show at Dimora Artica, Milan.
This work starts from a track realized sampling a fragment of Barnett Newman’s “The Sublime is Now” read by a text-to-speech software and then processed in Garageband (Apple devices’ default music production app) following composer Steve Reich’s “phasing” method. Two seminal landmarks that had been fundamental to the birth and development of Minimalism, treated in a deeply amateurish do-it-yourself process of appropriation, create nonetheless perfect ambient music. I have then designed the perfect environment in which to listen to this music.
2015 wallpainting
water-based paint on wall, environmental size
Work realized for “Giocando sulla Soglia” at Spazio Cabinet & Studiolo, Milan.
Alessandro Moroni 