Mauro Mori "Sometimes it is enough to be able to observe what is happening around us to grasp insights and be inspired"

Mauro Mori has traveled widely ever since his youth and expresses his perceptions of his trips through his innate manual creativity. His opportunity to meet people and cultures, different languages and unusual places supply the ideas on which his research is based and they are expressed in his functional and figurative personalized forms.

The shapes are simple as the hand’s mould that create them. The materials with witch Mauro Mori creates his unique works became from our Natural heritage, exalting what the Nature has created. His works are directly molded by hands and not by machines so they brings emotional and affective values.

Solid blocks of natural material, often worked in their places of origin, like the Albizia Rosa of Seychelles or the marble, hand-picked and worked directly at Carrara, are the origins of the unique hand-made shapes. The plasticity of the materials, the relief work on them and the intended and evident craftsmanship constitute the common thread running through all his work and reveals the desired form through a process of subtraction.

His constant research and development is also shown by the work on the metals, which are tooled in plate form and finished with oxidations and patinas.

In 1994 he started his own business and in the 1998 he inaugurated his own atelier, Mauro Mori Studio.
In January 2014 has founded Hand©, a no-profit association that helps people, artists and craftsmen, in a physical, economic or other discomfort stresses.

Quinque console (©) Mauro MoriPhoto Gian Paolo Barbieri

Quinque console (©) Mauro Mori
Photo Gian Paolo Barbieri

 

Lets discover more about Mauro Mori

– What are the biggest challenges you have met in your career?

Perhaps the greatest challenge has been to transform a great passion into a solid profession. In the 90s, when I started, the market for collectible design already existed but was not as widespread as today. Then, for those like me who use their hands to translate a thought, an idea into three dimensions, the challenge with the material itself is a daily challenge. 

– How would you describe your work?

I create limited edition works, unique and customized pieces in natural materials such as: wood, stone, molten metal or sheet. I use traditional techniques that are often revisited and adapted; the starting concept is sculpture, working in subtraction and obtaining shapes from blocks of wood or stone. Manufacturer of art furniture is the correct definition. 

– How is your passion for visual art and design born?

The search for beauty, understood as value, I believe belongs to all. In my case it is prompted by an innate curiosity and the possibility of making new discoveries through the comparison with cultures different from mine.

– What is the most difficult work you have done and why?

I would say that they are different and for different reasons. For me that I make crafts, large ones are more difficult, both for the realization and for the application of finishes or patinas. Difficulties often lead you to discover new things and improve.

– What is your main source of inspiration?

Probably my daily life, my environment. The continuous interconnections between places and people, approach knowledge as a process of endless transformation.

Sometimes it is enough to be able to observe what is happening around us to grasp insights and be inspired.

– What about your next project?

I am preparing my next exhibition in 2024 at Les Ateliers Courbet in N.Y.

– Outside of design, what are you currently interested in and how is it influencing your design work?  

I have always been interested in primitive art, but also fascinated by the desire to break with modern art. I like “good stories”, whether they are told through a good book or through a good film, maybe avant-garde!

I like to listen and look for the essence of things. I like to be in contact with nature, as wild as possible. I like the anatomy of the human body and I have always been fascinated by molecular biology with its forms…These and others are among the interests that I constantly renew and that accompany my work.

(©) Mauro Mori

Mauro Mori