The Caterpillar – Art in Metamorphosis

A site-specific project by RUFA Fine Arts students

The Caterpillar is the new artistic intervention created by second-year students of the RUFA Fine Arts Master’s Programme, who have transformed the rooms of Hotel Parrasio — a building currently undergoing rebranding — into an immersive journey dedicated to the theme of metamorphosis.
The hotel spaces become passageways, suspended between what once was and what is yet to come, reinterpreted through installations, participatory interventions and performances that explore the concept of transformation.

The artists behind the project

Six young RUFA artists have developed a visual and sensorial narrative reflecting on change:
– Pedro Henrique Simplicio
– JANO (Lydia Monsen and Hideyoshi Sato)
– Supriya Ravishankar
– Kira Bowling
– Michelle Ronaly Kuruwitaarachchi

Each artist has worked on the idea of transformation as an open process: not a fixed symbol, but a continuous movement in which space loses its original structure to become a field of possibilities. Visitors are invited to observe how a place in transition can generate new forms of storytelling.

Learn more about RUFA artists’ interventions

Room 111
Title: Membrane
Artist: Michelle Ronaly Kuruwitaarachchi
Concept: “Hotels are designed as spaces of passage; points where journeys pause, converge, and diverge. They are rarely beginnings or endings, only brief moments in between. In that pause, you become more aware of yourself”.

Room 333:
Title: Suspended Shore
Artist: Supriya Ravishankar
Concept: “This installation is a private, ephemeral beach world amidst the energy of the party above. The floor is covered in a thin layer of sand, inviting visitors to walk, leaving soft, shifting footprints”.

Room 888:
Title: someone who is no one ー one person dissolving into a nameless existence
Artist: Lydia Monsen, Hideyoshi Sato
Concept: “This installation transforms a soon-to-be-demolished hotel room into a space where every boundary gently begins to dissolve. The mirrors no longer return the viewer’s image as it is; instead, echoing Japanese folklore in which mirrors open toward other worlds, they reflect moments when the contours of reality subtly waver”.

An urban laboratory of metamorphosis

The project was developed within the RUFA Master’s Programme in Fine Arts, a course that encourages research, experimentation and dialogue with real urban spaces.
Working within a building in transition means engaging with its memory and its capacity to transform, fostering reflection on the relationship between art, architecture and community.

The project is curated by Marta Jovanović, Coordinator of the Visual Arts Department, and Davide Dormino, artist and RUFA Sculpture lecturer.

PROGRAMME

Friday 28 and Saturday 29 November
Friday 5, Saturday 6 and Sunday 7 December
Activities scheduled from 7:00 PM onwards.
Ex Hotel Parrasio, Salita del Bosco Parrasio 5, Rome.

ACCESS PROCEDURES

Access is granted exclusively through nominal accreditation.
Accreditation with accompanying guest: send an email to rsvp@tramp.it
Subject: “Demolition @ Ex Parrasio”
Email body: First and Last Name
(Each accreditation grants two entries via QR code).

Evento produced by TRAMP | CAMPO MAGNETICO | DARKNOON | BUCOLICO per BOSCO PARRASIO | HOTEL PARTICOLARE © tramp 2025.

 

Useful links from the RUFA website

RUFA Fine Arts Master’s Programme
RUFA Events
Master’s Admissions
RUFA Campus
28.11.2025
Salita del Bosco Parrasio, 5, 00153 Roma RM

Event type

  • Exhibitions
  • RUFA Culture

Featured for:

  • Fine Arts
  • Painting
  • Sculpture and Installations