Robert Morris: Films and Videos

Mart presents the first retrospective exhibition in Italy dedicated to the films and videos of Robert Morris (Kansas City, 1931). One of the key figures of the 20th century, both for his artistic work and for the fundamental nature of his theoretical texts. An engineer by training, Morris focuses his research on the elementary expressive properties of matter: the weight, volume, and shape determined by gravity.

His examination of sculpture does not stop with the object, however. Since 1963 at the Judson Dance Theater, the crossroads of American experimental work of the ’60s, Robert Morris has been interpreting theatre and cinema with the eyes of a sculptor. Through the extreme use of slow-motion, stylised gestures, alternation between synchronous and asynchronous, projected in the large spaces of the Mart, the historic performances and his most important films made between 1963 and 2005 are confronted with sculptures and sound installations. Neo Classic, Mirror, Slow Motion and Birthday Boy—the latter dedicated to the 500th anniversary of Michelangelo’s David—complete the investigation into primary forms, giving us moving arts in terms of the most exquisitely physical. With the Robert Morris. Films and Videos exhibition, the Mart continues its research into the great masters of contemporary art and the various forms it takes.