SPAZIO N°3

The third chapter is entirely dedicated to SPAZIO No. 3 and to Moretti’s accompanying editorial titled ‘Abstract Forms in Baroque Sculpture.’ The chapter is opened by the translation from Italian to English of Moretti’s text. In his steering editorial, Moretti addresses the theme of perceptive reading and the very conception of form in its ‘plastic valence,’ focusing on the shift it underwent in the transition between Renaissance and Baroque. Moretti emphasises the appearance, in Baroque sculpture, of what he defines as ‘particular plastic zones’ that cannot be defined as decorations and, moreover, do not fall into any functional category. He therefore argues that it is precisely during the Baroque that we see the ‘fracture’ of the equipotential reality of the Renaissance, revealing the instability of a new perceptual category. In this way, Moretti introduces the temporal and mnemonic variable into the perception of plastic form, increasing its expressive potential, thanks to this new framework of references. The translation of Moretti’s editorial offers the opportunity to set up the subsequent essay of critical commentary ‘Architectural Forms in the Thinking of Luigi Moretti and Peter Eisenman,’ approaching the subject through a double lens that compares Moretti’s theory with a specific part of the American school that belongs to the journal Opposition. The chapter will analyse the profound relationships between Moretti’s approach and the theoretical approach of another distinguished architectural theorist, Peter Eisenmann, who has repeatedly, and openly, drawn inspiration from it. The chapter is closed by the iconographic documentation containing reproductions of the articles in their original layout, which provides valuable support for researchers all over the world.