Austrian artist Klaus Pinter explores the potential of the space around us with his fantastical floating installations. Usually suspended in mid air, his giant artworks are at once light, fluid, soft, and mechanical. They are also incredibly bizarre, created using a combination of different textures and inflatable materials like plastic and nylon. Many who see his works describe them as curious flying machines and angelic cocoons, speaking to the artist’s ability to alter our perceptions, even the way we see famous landmarks from the Pantheon in Rome to the Seine waterway in Paris. For his installation exhibited at the Pantheon in 2002, titled “Rebounds”, the artist rolled two huge spheres into the extravagant Ancient Roman building, where his work collided art with history and culture. One sphere was placed on the ground and another was mounted so that it appeared to float in the choir, where the reflection of the building appeared as distorted as an M.C. Escher drawing. This placement was a choice made by the artist in reference to philosopher Plato’s ideology, who speculated on the nature of the physical world and human beings. In his biography, Pinter shares that from the beginning of creating his first “pneumatic” structures, the inventor in him was inspired, if not assimilated, by the poet. And throughout his career he has carried on in this vein with consistency and rigor, in forms that are continually renewed.

Via Hi Fructose