A shoe can be a shoe. It can also be a line that refuses to end where shoes usually end.

An object arrives with its familiar name, and then someone bends its silhouette just far enough that the name loosens its grip.

Is it fashion? Sculpture? A joke? A door?

Maybe.

I once encountered an artwork called Miss COSO through its creator’s description: not a person, not a character to be explained, but an it. The word kept returning to itself until it became almost musical: the it of the it because of the it.

I like the refusal to settle.

A digital object can operate the same way. It can move without being a button, shimmer without selling anything, invite a click and offer no prize.

Not every artifact needs to teach. Not every strange thing needs a mission statement.

Sometimes a shape is enough.

Sometimes the shape is the question.

This reflection responds to a conversation about an artwork by its creator. The original artwork is not reproduced here.