When I walked into Kage's (Pietro Merlini) studio and started looking at his work, I immediately knew that I had the privilege of meeting a great artist.

The first question I asked Pietro was spontaneous: “What does Kage mean?”
“Shadow, in Japanese.”

Indeed, it is immediately clear to us in the artist's works the importance of shadows.
Every figure, human and non-human, that appears in his paintings is characterized by a counter movement,

by a reflection that often assumes greater importance than the figure itself.
Is there more importance in what we leave behind us?

Our reflection is the guardian of our thoughts and perhaps also of our loneliness. It hides behind us carrying with it the weight of the unspoken, what we must and want to hide,
or why not ,protect from the urban chaos of our world. Kage contrasts his art with the frenetic dynamism of the everyday life, giving us the opportunity to stop time in a flowing image, creating visions that are evocative but at the same time concrete.

These are urban scenes, common moments of everyday life on which the artist dwells, almost as if he were studying from above, the lives of each of the protagonists busy on their way.

Evident in Kage's work is his background as a street artist. The speed of execution and the instinctive choice of colors and shades, the protagonists of the paintings and their shadows that appear as stencils, have clear references to the urban context, characteristic of that cultural movement.

In the works, the figures are stripped of bodily details, the distinctive features of the individuals are missing, which the

artist presents to us as delicate and evanescent shadows, in a continuous march toward the paths charted by our duties, almost like soldiers in a remote-controlled army.

Here is the critique of the excessive ego-centered speed of our society, and here is the communicative as well
as pictorial greatness of Kage, who succeeds in astutely making us perceive through the use of reflections

and our own shadows our real being, our complex, hidden and suspended part, the chest of our fragile human weakness that bangs and separates from our mechanical continuous movement.

Kage's mark is unique, instinctive, precise and endowed with a great sense of composition. The backgrounds of his works are certainly no less important than his characters. Fresh on fresh: on a synthetic color base, the artist intervenes with water colors that dry very quickly compared to the background, creating effects of movement and abstract depth, in a controlled alchemy that contributes fundamentally to the characteristic atmospheres of his works. It is interesting to see how these “ nets” of color, which are formed by the skillful juxtaposition of different techniques, mingle with the characters, who are swept away by them as if by a blow of wind.

In the end, Kage's works, are a gentle but powerful invitation to reflection.
The multitude of people uncontrollably crowding our frenetic everyday life only touches us, for a moment, a fraction of a breeze, before dissolving and leaving us alone with our shadow, which escorts us through its natural time, not subject to artifactual modernity and therefore pure and vital.

Gregorio Fornaciai