Life is different on the 17th floor. The elasticity of the building fabric feels quite unlike that experienced on the 1st or 2nd floors. At this height, it bleeds into daily existence. It facilitates views normally afforded only to gulls but at the parallel 55.8 and the meridian -4.2 (an intersection better known as Glasgow) the proximity to an unleavened sky bows heads and lies heavy on souls. Its deleterious effects, imperceptible by all but the newly arrived, is worn as a coat amongst locals for whom this is but the tapestry of life. Indeed, if gravitational extremities connote any religious sense of place at all, then it is observed…this heaven rains. Heavily. Some bear crosses. Glaswegians bear clouds…a spritz of water enough to dampen (but not snuff out) the joy of life. These are the perfect conditions for black humour. The oil to grease the grinding day. The genius of Vlad Butucea’s Silkworm is we see the genesis of that.

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