ERANO STATI UNITI

In "ERANO STATI UNITI" (They Were United), the artist stages the decay of the ultimate political simulacrum: the American flag. Through a process of material deconstruction, the work transforms the banner—historically a symbol of monolithic union and shared values—into a series of anemic, isolated shreds. The stars and stripes lose their structural cohesion, succumbing to a gravity that feels as much moral as it is physical; the strips of fabric hang from the wall like the remains of an organism no longer capable of sustaining itself.
The piece serves as a potent metaphor for the unraveling of the social contract and the decline of American cultural hegemony. This dismemberment reflects the drift of neoliberal economics, where the exaltation of the private sphere and atomized individualism prevail over the collective, dismantling the welfare state until it is unrecognizable. The flag no longer exists as an entity, but only as a memory evoked by its disconnected parts: the nation has literally "dissolved," giving way to a reality where components once integrated now lead separate, sterile existences. "ERANO STATI UNITI" is thus not merely a historical observation contained within its titular wordplay, but a visual indictment of the stasis that follows the end of a collective dream.