Michail Pirgelis / New Positions, Art Cologne 2010

This year, the winner of the Audi Art Award for New Positions at Art Cologne 2010 is Michail Pirgelis. The artist, represented by Sprüth Magers, Berlin / London has been awarded with a solo exhibition at artothek Cologne. The aim of the award is to support the best emerging artist among the New Positions presentations at Art Cologne.

Michail Pirgelis’ solo presentation at Art Cologne reflects the dream of flying. Pirgelis creates sculptures that are all based on original parts of airplanes. “Pirgelis’ works oscillate between readymade, appropriation and autonomous sculpture, but they also transcend these categories, not least of all through the material which he favors. The airplane parts which, even after their actual utilization, continue to be valuable, and which Pirgelis collects from scrapyards throughout the world, extend the history of the objet trouvé by establishing an extreme position. The concentration on the airplane, which has been optimized with regard to its utilization by human beings in accordance with natural law, situates the works in a productive discourse concerning the relationship between humanity and the technological progress which has had a decisive influence on a modernism characterized by reflection. Flight as the ‘most improbable’ form of human locomotion, together with its mythic connotations, continues in this context to be imbued with a deep fascination.” (press text related to Michail Pirgelis’ first solo exhibition at Sprüth Magers Berlin).

Michail Pirgelis solo show at Art Cologne 2010.

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