ROME.- On Friday, April 29th, Pastificio Cerere Foundation presented Die Kammern des Zustands, the first Italian solo show of the Swiss artist Reto Pulfer (Berna, 1981) curated by Vincenzo de Bellis with the support of the Swiss Institute in Rome. Site specific works realized for the ex pasta factory of San Lorenzo are shown in the exhibition. The artist has conceived a unique, big installation that involves the whole space of the Foundation, instead of small rooms in which public could walk (as in Thyme Change Theme Park).

Reto Pulfer sums his conceptual interest in the idea of Zustand, German translation for “moods”. They manifest themselves through five different environments in separated rooms that public has to investigate. Rooms are set up as a game of structures in which compositions' elements can change exactly as it happens with moods.

“A Zustand is complete in itself but it's stable just for a limited time, as these spaces”, tells Reto Pulfer. In the first two rooms, the artist uses pre-existing architectural spaces as containers, installing two-dimensional and tridimensional works. In the big room, the area is divided into three levels that identify different environments in which the visitor follows a conceptual path that ends with the final “state of mind”.

A sculpture, an installation or a performance of Reto Pulfer is conceived according to artist's personal rules even if public can freely interpret it. Artworks' titles provide technical informations on the composition and the function. “Reto Pulfer's works are in the middle between a rebus and an index. Their assemblage reflects the interest of the artist for the language intended as a series of structures that regulate the communication. Moving an element from a point to another modifies dramatically the meaning of a particular thing.”, tells Vincenzo de Bellis.

Die Kammern des Zustands is part of the 2011 exhibition program organized by Vincenzo de Bellis, curator in residence at Pastificio Cerere Foundation.

Reto Pulfer is also the second protagonist of Postcard from…, an annual two-month project in which five artists create a 400x300 cm billboard. The project is realized in collaboration with A.P.A. - Agenzia Pubblicità Affissioni, ideated by Marcello Smarrelli and curated by Vincenzo de Bellis for this appointment. Postcard from… involves the city of Rome with public-spaces art interventions and wants to take art in unexpected places. The poster is fixed on a structure that is installed in Pastificio Cerere's yard. The same image is proposed in ten different structures managed by A.P.A. following the typical advertisement turnover. The list of the structures will be posted on the Foundation web site.

Reto Pulfer's billboard are exhibited in conjunction with Die Kammern des Zustands and present a ceramic sculpture located in a travel box. Image's iconography seems confused but it's subsequently explicated by the title Hirn (brain). The woody box isn't just a container for the artwork but also a paradoxical cranial box that protects brain itself. Some isolated written words express brain's ability of creating, imagining, talking and producing illusions. These words communicate themes and ideas at the base of Reto Pulfer's work. The billboard's project is transformed in a self-portrait and statement of his creative process.

Reto Pulfer was born in 1981 in Berna. Lives and works in London and Arlesheim. For 2011, he will be artist in residence at Swiss Institute in Rome. A selection of his solo shows: Present Future to Balice Hertling gallery for Artissima, Turin; Der Themenkatalog und andere Künstlerbücher, Archive Kabinett, Berlino; Der Themenkatalog und andere Künstlerbücher, FormContent, London (2010); Der unmerkliche Zugang, Kunstverein of Arnsberg, Z'Innre redet im Öißre, Wartesaal, Zurig (2009); Die Auflösung mit ZR O GIP NG, Montgomery, Berlin; Die Gunst der Sunde, die Kunst der Wunde, Galerie Balice Hertling, Paris(2008). He exposed into numerous collective shows, such as The Village Cry Regionale, Kunsthalle Basel, Swiss Art Awards, Basel, Animism, Kunsthalle Berna, Animism, ExtraCity & Muhka Museum of Contemporary Art, Antwerp, The Obstacle is Tautology, Atelier Benoît Maire, Paris (2010); The Object of the Attack, David Roberts Foundation, London, À corps & à texts, La Galerie de Noisy-le-Sec, France, modern modern, Chelsea Art Museum, New York (2009); Comes and Goes, Kunstverein Arnsberg, Germany, Liste Performance Art Project, Liste Basel; Object, the Undeniable Success of Operations, Stedelijk Museum Bureau, Amsterdam (2008).

Vincenzo de Bellis (1977) is co-director and co-curator of Peep-Hole, contemporary art centre founded in 2009 in Milan with Bruna Roccasalva and Anna Daneri. A selection of recent exhibition projects realized by Peep-Hole: Pavel Buchler & Evangelia Spiliopoulou.Working Title; J. Parker Valentine.Cut-Outs-Inter-Sections; Corrado Levi. Quasi, Autoamori di Johnny e una poesia; Mario Garcia Torres. I Will Be With You Shortly; Alicja Kwade. Broken Away from Common Standpoints; Ahmet Ogut. Mind the Gap. De Bellis is the editor of Peep-Hole Sheet, out now with the num. 7, with contributions by Liam Gillick, John Miller, Dora Garcia, Jonathan Horowitz, Massimo Grimaldi, Matias Faldbakken e Pavel Buchler. In 2010 he has been guest curator for Museion, Bolzano where he has curated the exhibition Soft Information in Your Hard Facts of Gabriel Kuri. In 2008 he took the Master of Arts in Curatorial Practice at the Center For Curatorial Studies, Bard College, Annandale On Hudson, NY. In 2007 and 2008 he has curated the following projects: Countdown, Hessel Museum of Art and Center For Curatorial Studies, Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, NY (2008); Pietro Roccasalva - Z, Park Avenue Armory, New York (2008); Lost and Found City, Storefront for Art and Architecture, New York (2007). de Bellis collaborates with Mousse Magazine.