This is a picture of Aleksandra Mir’s Plane Landing, a helium-filled balloon in the shape and size of a passenger jet plane. It is suspended above the ground, and thus in a permanent state of landing. Displayed at Compton Verney in a Capability Brown designed landscape, it will travel to all kinds of ‘picture postcard’ destinations. The production of the balloon, its inflation, its travel and documentation of all these actions all are part of the artwork.

Quote from ‘from studio to situation’, Mir and Doherty in conversation, page 69: “The plane is situated outdoors in an open-air situation. It is surrounded by a landscape; in this case, the Capability Brown designed parkland of the Compton Verney House. My further intentions are to take the plane to a variety of different surroundings: California desert, Manhattan skyline, Swiss Alps, Dutch flower fields, to offeset these environments and make them apparent. As small human bodies we often take our surroundings for granted as natural entities, their size and permanence in relation to ours more or less demand that we adapt to them and not vice versa. But every landscape is also the result of previous human intervention and I am interested in making this resonant.”