My Cute Network State^^

what
political lab, physical and digital objects

where
online + TBA

collaborators
~

year
in progress

This project explores the possibility of constructing a digital state—an artistic and conceptual prototype grounded in the architecture proposed by Balaji Srinivasan in The Network State. Rather than endorsing his vision, I approach it as a thought experiment: what happens when we take such techno-political blueprints seriously—not to celebrate them, but to test them? To stretch their assumptions until they reveal something else entirely.

I am interested in building spaces for speculative governance—playgrounds where uncomfortable, even perverse, ideas can be enacted and examined without immediately seeking resolution. The notion of founding a state from scratch is both seductive and troubling. It promises clarity, but always at the cost of something messy and unresolved. If anarchist micro-kingdoms collapse by becoming the very hierarchies they reject, what happens when hierarchy is constructed intentionally, as part of the structure, not a bug?




This project treats technology not as a neutral tool, but as a medium through which fantasies of power, identity, and order are continuously reimagined. In particular, I am drawn to the rising cultural fascination with monarchism, the medieval, and the symbolic aesthetics of rule. This romanticization—visible across memes, speculative fiction, online ideologies—suggests a desire for forms of belonging that are rigid, aestheticized, and emotionally charged. Perhaps this is the direction we are heading, and if so, it’s worth understanding why.

Rather than proposing solutions, I am interested in simulating possible futures—ones that are awkward, extreme, or ideologically inconsistent. To experiment politically is not to affirm, but to risk. This project asks: how far can we go in testing the architectures of statehood before they collapse into parody—or, perhaps more unsettlingly, into something real?

The project draws inspiration from various sources, including Dune & Raby's "United Micro Kingdoms" and the "Wóz Drzymały" as a historical Polish example of a temporary autonomous zone.

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