archival pigment prints
edition 3+2 APs
2012 -
Working with the standard media of architectural representation – plans and perspectives – spatio-architectonic fragments from various historical epochs are investigated, manipulated, and montaged into compositions that – through scaling, repetition, contrast, and estrangement – become increasingly absurd. Mediating the sterility of everyday functional space and the sculptural exuberance of representational buildings, the work forges an insight into built reality, uncovering from seeming objectivity and functionalism the existential drama of choreographed designs and spatial contestation. Endless enfilades unfold in monotonous repetition, abandoned scenery flows between harsh, towering buildings … men appear lost, dominated by their built environment. In these scenes, unsettling but familiar situations emerge from a manipulated analysis of architectural references. Ideologically-loaded architecture and the crime scenes of human history are set in relation to one another – confrontational, overlapped, estranged – critically thematizing the mechanisms of intimidation and overwhelming used in the exercise of power. Archetypes and palaces, monuments and landmarks, cathedrals and temples, prisons and camps, fortresses, bunkers and superblocks, are woven into an architectural phantasmagory which, though fictional, are formed from existing designs.

Michael Hirschbichler, PALACE II , 2013

Michael Hirschbichler, LOCKER ROOM , 2014

Michael Hirschbichler, COLONNADE, 2014

Michael Hirschbichler, SICK ROOM , 2013

Michael Hirschbichler, SQUARE II, 2013

Michael Hirschbichler, STATION , 2015

Michael Hirschbichler, SQUARE III, 2013

Michael Hirschbichler, SQUARE II, 2013

Michael Hirschbichler, CHOIR STALLS, 2015

Michael Hirschbichler, CANTEEN, 2015

Michael Hirschbichler, AXIS, 2013

Michael Hirschbichler, AVENUE, 2013

Michael Hirschbichler, THEATER , 2013

Michael Hirschbichler, CORRIDOR, 2013

Michael Hirschbichler, INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX I, 2014

Michael Hirschbichler, INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX II, 2014

Michael Hirschbichler, INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX III, 2015

Michael Hirschbichler, EMBANKMENT, 2014

Michael Hirschbichler, BOULEVARD I, 2015

Michael Hirschbichler, BOULEVARD II, 2015

Michael Hirschbichler, BOULEVARD III, 2015