Michal Lapinski Studio

There are essentially two systems. They become tangible and perceptible in the middle of the night. Which does not mean they only exist then. After all, they may be contained within a four-dimensional cyber-psychic space. But there they exist in latent form, and their shape remains unknown to us. One might suppose that they multiply and replicate there in secret. Only from time to time does one of the planes surface and materialise in the misty enfilade of incompletions. And soon after, a second one appears, being its reflection, its mirror image, or perhaps its clone. And so their dance begins.

​

It is therefore not impossible that there are more systems. But at any one time, over the course of a single night — or perhaps only in a few-minute fragment of it — one can commune with only two.

But even with these two systems, the matter is not straightforward. A system can be described as a multi-layered relationship of potentially several, though essentially two, strata moving through time and space, evolving one into the other, and continually changing — usually slightly, not radically — their properties and perceptible elements. It must be emphasised here that we are speaking of something which is by its very nature imprecise, blurred. Although not devoid of elements that can be geometrised, it is not sharp, but granular and bulbous.

​

The systems seem to serve a similar function, though its nature is not entirely clear. They appear to have something in common, but the nature of their relationship remains unknown. Each of them takes shape as a certain three-dimensional plane, which is meant to serve the resolution of some problem. At the same time it creates a problem of its own, one that must be confronted, not without confusion and anxiety. Communing with the systems is meant to lead to some development, a conclusion, and a release from confusion and tension; yet it also exhausts, ensnares, and drains one's strength. A system cannot be grasped, yet it cannot be gotten rid of either. Nor is it clear which one should be engaged with at any given moment in order for some turning point — perhaps eventually a resolution — to occur. Relief is hard to find.

​

The first system is darker, heavier, more menacing. It appears grey and navy blue, as a three-dimensional scale model of some undefined space. It might be the geographic space of a landscape from a distant, extinct planet, or a inept, muddled representation of the chart on which nurses in a hospital record the daily medications. This shape moves, changes form, but never dissolves completely. It drifts like a flying flat and contorted octopus without tentacles.

​

The second system is essentially similar, with a comparable formula, except that it is lighter, gentler, grey with a dull hue. It constitutes a certain alternative to the dark, more menacing system. It seems to offer some hope that turning toward it might bring some relief, some resolution. This, however, does not happen.

​

Thus engagement with the systems leads to a constant oscillation between two possibilities which are probably versions of the same problem — a problem that is never fully formulated, yet exists in a difficult clench: it does not disappear, and it torments. There is no escape. There is no relief.

 

There is no clarity.

​

There is none … not one noon … there is no, not I why… there is noooooo… no Manon… mais non le nom n'est plus… no way Norway… away