VR helmet from the 60s: Walter Pichler's futuristic concepts

These futuristic prototypes are a series of works created in the 60s by the artist Walter Pichler, which explore the intersection of several types of art at once – architecture, design and sculpture. The Austrian artist used relatively new materials for that time, including polyester, plexiglass and PVC.

In 1967, Pichler came up with the" TV helmet", a device that isolates the user from the outside world and immerses him in an endless web of information: the helmet was made so that nothing distracts the user from the screen in front of his eyes.

Pichler not only predicted VR glasses that would be developed many years later: he also formulated questions about the content of media perception long before the appearance of the"virtual world". Pichler was probably already a critic of the mass media at that time, and remains so to this day. But he is also a conceptually thinking artist who explored space early-beyond the four walls and urban buildings. Pichler called his new invention a "portable living room".

His innovative developments, "Prototypes", are" pneumatic plastic bubbles for life " from the 60s, which tried to answer questions about the individualization of life in the future through design, architecture and art. Using references to space travel and modern materials, Pichler awakens a thirst for the future with his futuristic sculptures – even if there is a slight skeptical or sarcastic tinge in his works.

Pichler wrote these words in 1962, on the eve of an exhibition where he worked with another Viennese architect Hans Hollein: