When Andy Moro left Windsor, ON in his later teen years, he set his sights on Montreal and the arts. Thirty years later, he is co-director with Tara Beagan of ARTICLE 11, and opening a show at the Royal Ontario Museum.
Moro’s journey through the arts has had many extreme turns. After being kicked out of two different arts training institutions, he continued pursuing his practice the way he wanted to – unbound by curricula, medium and ordinary work schedules. Industrial design, glass blowing, print-making, clowning, and community arts all fed into Moro’s greatest passion – live performance design.
Toronto’s veteran theatre makers recall an eager young Andy, working as TD at the Factory Theatre in the early 90s. Andy quickly merged into design, collaborating with dada kamera and Video Cabaret for several years. After co-founding Red Pepper Spectacle Arts, and exponentially growing Kensington Market’s Festival of Lights, Andy refocused his energies in 2012 to concentrate on theatre and move towards the goal of creating installation works.
Andy’s goals are coming to fruition by the bucketload. ARTICLE 11 had an installation/live creation lab, DECLARATION, featured in the Ontario Scene at the National Arts Centre in April/May 2015. Moro’s set, lighting and projection design transformed the Salon at the NAC into an amorphous, ethereal creation lab that boasted renowned artists Digging Roots, Monique Mojica, Santee Smith, revered film critic/programming maverick Jesse Wente and a communal collaboration of welcoming with local Ottawa artists and Nipissing First Nations based Aanmitaagzi.
A re-invented iteration, with all-new guest collaborators, will open with a live performance at the ROM’s Roloff Beny Gallery on June the 5th and remain as an installation through to June 21st, 2015. DECLARATION: Repatriation celebrates emerging Indigenous artists as the greatest pathways to a questioning of the status quo, juxtaposing this eager pursuit with the solid grounding of storied literary icon Lee Maracle in a turn called “Ask an Elder.”
As this work claims its space in a major institution, Moro’s work as a theatre designer – on all fronts – can be experienced at the Aki Studio Theatre in Culture Storm’s production of Cliff Cardinal’s stitch. Joining Moro in his professional theatrical debut is Moro’s son, Luca Caruso-Moro, as composer. Luca is the incendiary percussionist behind indie-punk fright Belt Fight, a musically virtuosic handful of young men who are quaking the underground music scene.
Moro heads west later this summer to collaborate with the Dancers of Damelahamid and to return to his position as a core member of the creation team at the Banff Centre’s Indigenous Dance Residency.
