When we take a closer look at the objects connected by pipes, we find that they can be perceived not only as repositories or boxes where the imaginary contents of the intricate piping system flow, but also as models, backdrops for buildings. Figuratively, then, they can act as branches of the delivery institution itself. This can be done both by using elements based on architecture and by using a certain scenographic element, e.g. in the form of fragments of a puppet evoking a postman or a postal clerk inhabiting a given “branch”. The mailboxes are connected to the pedestals, which, with their objects, merge into a broader structure, complementing each other, telling about each other. If we, as viewers, take on the visual metaphor of the delivery system and its individual parts, the scenic nature of the whole installation is heightened, and a glimpse into this closed world will be even more inviting in its scale to explore the details of the individual moments of the process unfolding on the “stage”. The authors of the exhibition, Jakub Hájek and František Hanousek, consciously work with content and formal contrasts, which they thoughtfully and with dark humour escalate to the point of absurdity.

The absurdity and irony in the works resonate strongly from the first reading. The authors were inspired by the rational system of the 19th century German postal system, or rather by a chapter in the book The Utopia of Rules by the recently deceased American anthropologist David Graeber, which discusses the technology and maturity of the German delivery system of the time and illuminates how closely this institution is intertwined, on a general level, with concepts of social and political systems (including their manipulative level) during the 19th century, with consequences that continue to the present day. The rationality and high-tech ethos of the German post office of the century before last is lost on the viewer in the exhibition, juxtaposed with the shabby tubes of the piped post office and the mailboxes themselves, their dirt, charred, neglected, amateurish cleaning. The seriousness of the original purpose is deliberately and ironically undermined by the chosen form. The question arises as to how the state delivery system is perceived by citizens at a time when its functions and services are increasingly being taken over by private companies. What does it say about today’s (advanced) society that in the 19th century the job of a postman had a serious sound, an aura of respectability, of which there is little left today?

In the system of installation that is presented to us, everything is connected into a single whole, and although it is logically built, we see that it is decaying, full of errors, perhaps caused by time, gradual wear and tear and obsolescence. The staff of the individual branches have tried to clean them up with their own inadequate efforts, to keep them running, to put the essentials in order and perhaps to make “their” environment more comfortable. The results of these efforts, however, only add to the impression of absurdity and futility. The penetration of chaos into the set rules of the originally functional system is mirrored in the drawing of knots on one of the boxes, in the flimsy wire walls that the authors of the exhibition gradually built out of their own intertwined wires, and in many other details of the artworks, including the way they were installed. The theme of the exhibited drawings is complemented by the motifs of the unstoppability of the (devilish) machine in motion, the suffocation of the environment, the tyranny and enslavement of the employees, the desire for career advancement through the various rungs of the ladder of the institutional hierarchy, etc. All this is presented by the authors in a very simplistic language full of funny abbreviations and chilling exaggerations.

Tereza Havlovicová & Ján Gajdušek