PNEUMA with Christian Fogarolli – Online Exhibition
Online Exhibition
PNEUMA with Christian Fogarolli
In an era in which the concept of mental health manifests at the crossroads between self-care and mass hysteria, are we still able to de-stigmatize and reconsider mental illness?
How do we deconstruct the binary categorization that distinguishes “deviance” from “normality”?
Due to the COVID19- situation the exhibition was open to a limited amount of guests.
For those of you that cannot visit the exhibition in person due to the current situation we decided to make the best of a bad situation:
We want to invite you to experience the Pneuma-journey online and through our social media channels. We want to create an occasion to interact and share our experiences over the past year. Pneuma is a journey that sets out to undermine the stigmatization of mental illness and the consequent social exclusion in times where we become increasingly aware of the value of individual freedom.
The Berlin stage of this journey will consist of interviews, footage, behind the scene snapshots and virtual tours. Don’t forget to keep an eye on our Facebook and Instagram accounts to stay updated.
The Premises and the Urgencies
The Pneuma project’s first solo show at STATE Studio in Berlin is the culmination of a year of theoretical and empirical research, exploring the immateriality and intangibility of mental illness. Incidentally, Pneuma is in dialogue with the effects of COVID-19 on issues such as the psychological impact of collective traumatic events on the individual, the psychological implications of isolation and the increasing levels of anxiety and psychological fear, fuelled by an overload of information from the media.
PNEUMA
The artist created an exhibition itinerary of environmental installations in several materials, including photos of the preliminary research period, glass sculptures, a video piece and photographic works. The work was created during residencies and collaborations in ten different countries and thanks to the collaboration with brain research institutes such as the University of Trento (Centro Mente Cervello CIMeC) and King's College in London.
The project focuses on the immateriality and intangibility of mental illness by analyzing various geographical and cultural contexts. Pneuma thus questions the stigma and categorization created by political, corporate and state systems, which often reduce individuals to the disease they suffer from.
C.Fogarolli, Still video from Pneuma, film, 4K, 14'03 ", 2020, ed. 1 + AP. Realised thanks to the support of Italian Council (2019) © Rene Bade
Unveiling a Broken System
The Pneuma project set itself apart thanks to its intent to unhinge normative attributions of mental deviance and forms of taxonomy canonized by modern medical theories and western archival methodologies.
Beginning at Law 180, which reformed the psychiatric system in Italy in 1978 and the Helsinki European Declaration of 2005 on mental health, Fogarolli developed preliminary research and subsequently maintained a collaboration with some of the major European psychiatric institutions, establishing a firm relationship with the people who live and work in these places. He seeks to challenge, thanks to their help, the classification processes of mental disorders and the consequent marginalization of the individual.
The Transeuropean Approach
© CFogarolli Research Map
Christian Fogarollis various travels, research residencies, collaborations in ten different countries and immersion into multiple European realities led the artist to the conception of a project which consists of several immersive works, ideated and put together as a result of having cooperated so closely with people in care, medical personnel and researchers in different fields. The countries involved are Italy, Switzerland, Austria, Germany, France, Belgium, Holland, England, Romania, Czech Republic.
Documentation of the research project, 2020
The series of images gathers a selection of photographs taken by the artist during the preliminary research period in different European psychiatric institutions.
Geist
Geist © Rene Bade
Geist, Adem, Pneuma, 2020, installation, glass sculptures, rubber, steel, black sand, edible liquid colors, environmental dimensions.
Geist © Rene Bade
Pneuma
Pneuma © Rene Bade
Esprit Soul
The installation entitled Esprit Soul is composed of glass sculptures with the form of two neurons and a central spark generated by their encounter.
Esprit Soul © Rene Bade
Esprit Soul, 2020, installation, glass sculptures, steel, black sand, light, environmental dimensions.
Esprit Soul © Rene Bade
Adem
© Rene Bade, Adem
Adem, 2020, installation, glass sculptures, rubber, steel, black sand, edible liquid colors, environmental dimensions.
© Rene Bade, Adem
After each visit to a country where he has carried out research in relation to mental illness, the artist has subsequently created a glass sculpture in Murano. The sculptures, while interacting with each other, carry the title in different languages of the terms “pneuma, spirit, soul“. They represent different organs of the human body that have been linked through the centuries to the study of the relationship between mind and brain.
Artists Brain
This photographic work from digital graphics represents the brain of the artist. The photo has been realized thanks to the trattographic processing of data results from magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) realized on Fogarolli’s skull at the laboratories of the University of Trento CIMeC – Center for Mind/Brain Sciences, Rovereto / Trento, with the collaboration of Lisa Novello. Project supported by Italian Council (2019), Ministry of Cultural Heritage and Activities.
Artist’s Brain © Christian Fogarolli
Artist’s Brain, 2020, inkjet print on fine art paper, steel frame, museum glass, 40x30 cm.
PNEUMA in the news
Artist
Curator
All the works were carried out thanks to the support of the Italian Council 2019 and Italian Ministry of Cultural Heritage and Activities and Tourism.
Partners: STATE Studio, Berlin, MARe Museum, Bucharest, Art&Mind, film production, Paris, Schwarzescafé, Löwenbräukunst, Zurich,
The Perspective Project, London, Istituto Italiano di Cultura, Tel Aviv, Mambo - Museo di Arte Moderna, Bologna, CIMeC - Centro Interdipartimentale Mente / Cervello, Rovereto, Alma Mater Studiorum, Bologna IED, Istituto Europeo di Design, Venice, Jonas Onlus, Trento, Firenze, Varese, Palermo, Genova
With the kind support of STATE
Project Lead: Johanna Wallenborn
Head of Production: Christina Hooge
Production: José Labrado
and special thanks to Tyra Kaddu-Mulindwa, Veronika Natter, Simon Schmid and the whole STATE Team.