Systema wall object 14 | 2023 | brass, wood, plastic, paraffin, paint | ± 25 x 14 x 8 cm
Systema wall object 3 | 2023 | brass, wood, paraffin, resin, paint | ± 25 x 20 x 10 cm
Systema wall object 2 | 2023 | brass, plastic, paraffin, paint | ± 25 x 20 x 10 cm
Systema wall object 13 | 2023 | brass, wood, plastic, paraffin, paint | ± 25 x 12 x 4 cm
Systema wall object 1 | 2023 | brass, glass, paraffin, paint | ± 25 x 20 x 10 cm
Systema wall object 4 | 2023 | brass, wood, plastic, paraffin, resin, paint | ± 25 x 13 x 8 cm
Systema wall object 9 | 2023 | brass, reconstructed coral, paint | ± 25 x 17 x 9 cm
Systema wall object 5 | 2023 | brass, reconstructed coral, paraffin, paint | ± 25 x 20 x 12 cm
Systema wall object 6 | 2023 | brass, wood, plastic, paraffin, resin, paint | ± 15 x 10 x 8 cm
Systema wall object 15 | 2023 | brass, wood, plastic, paraffin, paint | ± 28 x 15 x 9 cm
Systema wall object 10 | 2023 | brass, plastic, paint | ± 35 x 15 x 10 cm
Systema wall object 10 | 2023 | brass, plastic, paint | ± 35 x 15 x 10 cm
Systema wall object 11 | 2023 | brass, glass, fishbones, plastic, paraffin, paint | ± 30 x 13 x 7 cm
Systema wall object 12 | 2023 | brass, wood, paraffin, resin, paint | ± 20 x 15 x 9 cm
Systema wall object 8 | 2023 | brass, plastic, paraffin, paint | ± 17 x 12 x 6 cm
Systema wall object 7 | 2023 | brass, wood, glass, cultivated coral, paraffin, resin, paint | ± 13 x 10 x 5 cm
Systema
My artistic practice is rooted in an ongoing investigation of the entangled relationship between the human body and technology. I am particularly drawn to the ambivalence this relationship evokes: the tension between enhancement and harm, control and vulnerability, the familiar and the uncanny. Technology’s dual capacity to heal and to disrupt—both protective and toxic—provides fertile ground for reflection and creation. It opens up imaginative space for a fluid, hybrid reality in which the boundaries between human and machine blur, and the body becomes part of a wider network of systems.
More recently, I have expanded this line of inquiry by incorporating the natural world into this entanglement. I consider nature, the body, and technology not as separate domains, but as elements of one interconnected system. Technological systems can be viewed as extensions or continuations of biological and ecological processes, rather than as external or artificial intrusions. Our bodies—like natural ecosystems—are composed of intricate, interdependent systems that reflect a form of natural logic, or what might be called organic technology.
This perspective challenges the conventional separations between nature and machine, human and environment. I view the skin not as a boundary, but as a permeable membrane through which constant exchange occurs—of air, energy, matter, and information. Technology is not outside of us; it is part of our ecology, our evolution, and our embodied experience. From this viewpoint, the human body can be seen as biological technology, shaped by and embedded within a larger natural system.
My recent research explores visual and structural analogies between biological, natural, and technological systems.
I am particularly drawn to the recurring structural patterns and formal echoes that connect biological, natural, and technological systems. The branching logic of circulatory and nervous systems mirrors that of trees, roots, and leaf veins. River networks resemble urban infrastructure in their organization of flow and connectivity. Neural pathways and computer circuitry reveal striking parallels in both form and function, as systems of transmission and processing. Even the internal workings of the human body—circulatory, digestive, respiratory—reflect the engineered complexity of machines, highlighting a shared systemic logic across organic and artificial forms.
These parallels suggest that what we perceive as distinct realms—organic, technological, natural—are in fact structurally and conceptually intertwined. My recent project, Systema, builds on these insights, exploring these interrelations through layered visual compositions that bring together anatomical, botanical, and technological forms.
Through this work, I seek to reflect on the illusion of separateness between body, machine, and environment, and to question dominant narratives that position technology as something external or oppositional to life. Instead, I propose a vision of co-evolution, in which the systems we create mirror the systems we inhabit—and, ultimately, the systems we are.
Katja Prins
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Katja Prins, 2025
Photography: Merlijn Snitker |