Artist: Reto Pulfer
Exhibition title: Fachzustand
Venue: Kunst Halle Sankt Gallen, St. Gallen, Switzerland
Date: May 31 – August 18, 2024
Photography: all images copyright and courtesy of the artist and Kunst Halle Sankt Gallen
Note: Exhibition’s floor plan is available
Reto Pulfer (*1981 in Berne/CH) transforms architecture. With self-sewn tents, oversized lengths of fabric, repurposed bedsheets, and coloured linen, the artist turns existing spaces into translucent worlds. His textile universes don’t impose any specific modes of interpretation or orientation. Instead, they are an opportunity to get lost and experience familiar surroundings in a new light. As visitors, we become integral parts of his installations, which he brings to life through performances and sound compositions.
For his solo show «Fachzustand» at Kunst Halle Sankt Gallen, Reto Pulfer is developing a new installation piece. An elongated, semi-transparent corridor made from converted fabrics will redefine the rooms on the ground floor of the 120-year-old Lagerhaus. Pulfer will also create a site-specific outdoor work, featuring the controversial stinging nettle as its protagonist. The plant, utilised for medicine, food, and textile raw material, already makes an appearance in Pulfer’s novel Gina. A Zustand Novel (2020). With gardening and engaging in nature as central practices in his work, Pulfer will establish a habitat for nettle plants and calendula flowers in the backyard of the Kunst Halle, connecting his architectural transformations to the public space.
The exhibition title plays with two versatile concepts. Zustand, German for current state, hints at the ephemerality of Pulfer’s tent-like installations, shape-shifting in every show and often repurposed for newer arrangements. Zustand also refers to the state of mind that Pulfer’s works evoke by creating spaces of affect. Fach, a technical term from weaving, is dedicated to the centuries-old textile tradition of the St.Gallen region. In preparation for this solo show, Pulfer familiarised himself with weaving techniques, acquiring both a weaving frame and a loom. Fach is the term used to describe the shed, which is the temporary opening created between the warp yarns through which the weft is woven. It is a poetic and even musical space, dynamically opening and closing amidst taut strings. Fach also refers to field of expertise, considering that Pulfer’s self-taught practice spans many techniques and approaches.
The textile cosmos of «Fachzustand» will transform into a soundscape during both the Summer Party on July 6 and the Finissage on August 18, as Reto Pulfer invites us to a performance and concert featuring guest artists and some sound objects he built himself.
RETO PULFER (*1981 in Berne/CH) grew up in Arlesheim, Basel/CH and lives and works in Angermünde/DE.
Solo exhibitions (selection): «Hüllen Zustand», Studio Mondial, Berlin/DE (2023); «Livingthings», Hollybush Gardens, London/UK (2022); «Blitzzustand», KunstHausPotsdam, Berlin/DE (2022); «Gegenwartsgewächse», Fundaziun Nairs, Scuol/CH (2020); «Ein Nebel aus Prä-Adamitischen Sternensprossen», AWHRHWAR, Los Angeles, California/USA (2019); «Dehydrierte Landschaft», Centre d’Art Contemporain, Geneva/CH (2015). Group exhibitions (selection): Art Basel Unlimited, Basel/CH (2024); «Parasiten», Kunst(Zeug)Haus, Rapperswil/CH (2024); «The Stomach and the Port», Liverpool Biennial, Liverpool/GB (2021); «Art en Plein Air», Môtiers, Neuchâtel/CH (2021); «En Pratiques», Lafayette Anticipations, Paris/FR (2020); «Weiche Raster», Kunstmuseum Olten, Olten/CH (2018); «Metamorphosis», Castello di Rivoli Museum of Contemporary Art, Turin/IT (2018).
