Michail Pirgelis Transforms Aircraft Parts into Sculptures at Kunstraum Dornbirn

Starting July 11, 2026, Kunstraum Dornbirn will host "HYLE," the first solo exhibition in Austria by Michail Pirgelis, an artist from Cologne born in 1976. The show will showcase a striking installation in the venue's historic assembly hall, where he reimagines parts from retired passenger planes, mainly collected from aircraft graveyards in California's Mojave Desert. By sanding, polishing, and breaking down fuselage panels and floor sections, he creates abstract sculptures that explore themes of readymade art, Minimalism, and Postminimalism, while questioning traditional ideas of perfection. Featured works include the impressive arches ECHO (2022) and UNIVRS (2012/2018), along with circular pieces like Memory Games (2017) and LOST (2022), plus the horizontal panels Desert Star I and II (both 2022). Over his two-decade career, Pirgelis has exhibited at places like Kunstraum Munich (2026) and the Athens Biennale (2018), winning awards such as the Berlin Scholarship (2013) and the Villa Romana Prize (2007).