RELATIVE SIMILARITIES III

In the series “Relative Similarities” (twin pairs), Izabella Gustowska takes as her starting point the perversity of nature, which produces a “duplicated object”—seemingly perfect, visually identical copies (statistically, one case in every 88 births).

At the core of the project lies a process of searching—a kind of game. A game the artist plays with the twins, or perhaps one that they play with her. What emerges here is a feedback loop within their mutual relations, directly shaping the act of recording itself.

Within this record, particular importance is given to the physical connection between the “objects” (the twin pairs) and their photographic or filmic representation, as well as to their constant variability. It becomes an attempt to capture and register a specific kind of “mimetic reality.”

As a result, an ongoing reflection unfolds on differences and similarities, as well as on the traces they leave behind. The initial situation—or more precisely, its documentation—returns in an expanded form, enriched with new meanings. Through a process developing over time, it transforms into a new form of reality.