The fountain-sculpture The Secret Lapse was built around an alienated object—a worn-out sock with holes. It is surrounded by clusters of flowers inspired by the drawing Morning from the Times of Day series by the Romantic painter Philipp Otto Runge. A seemingly trivial item elevated to the status of a sculptural object cast in noble material playfully challenges aesthetic and symbolic conventions related to form and material.

Szostek chooses bronze—traditionally associated with monumental works—to immortalize something ephemeral, used, and usually unnoticed. The result is an artwork that balances irony with poetic reflection on the status of objects, the idea of wear and disappearance. The piece also raises questions about the limits of control and chance in the creative process, as well as the social and cultural mechanisms of valuing objects and aesthetics.