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The Man Who Buries Planes

Turner-prize nominated artist Roger Hiorns is the man who buries planes. He's always been fascinated by the idea of taking an aircraft and putting it underground. You can hear more about Roger's mission in the Seriously... podcast.

Hiorns doesn't know exactly when it started: "It's got something to do with taking something out of the air and putting it under the skin of the land." For the artist, it was a way to provoke an idea. In the summer of 2016, along with Farmer Tim, he buried a military passenger aircraft in an undisclosed location in the East of England. And now the idea has grown internationally, becoming a "network" of aircraft under our feet.

Tim was intrigued by Roger’s project and had the land and know-how to help him bury another. Ensuring the land was moist enough to cut cleanly, alone on his digger he dug a giant crucifix-shaped hole.

These burials play with systems of power and question brute masculinity, elegantly reflecting environmental issues and globalisation. There’s an end of the world quality to what Hiorns creates. He describes it as a gesture towards changing the status quo; changing our relationship to planes.

The MiG 21 was the most widely produced supersonic fighter plane in the Eastern Bloc during the Cold War. To some Czechs it looks like a toy. To others it symbolises a painful moment in history. Now one lies next to a science park on the outskirts of Prague, placed there by Hiorns in collaboration with the city's Galerie Rudolfinum.

If you allow a plane to be buried, a new ritual or perspective is arrived at. As Farmer Tim says: "It wasn’t until we lowered the plane in and you could look at the nose, did something say to me: 'Yeah, I can see it now'".

Listen to The Man Who Buries Planes to learn more about Roger and his quest to build a network of buried aircraft.

(All images courtesy of Roger Hiorns)

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