Andrew Russeth examines the positive qualities of influence in the work of painter David Malek. In Malek’s exhibition Hexagons at Rawson Projects his work seems to engage in unapologetic dialogues with several system based painters including (early) Frank Stella and Sol Lewitt.  However, Russeth remarks, “What once looked logical, rational, and predetermined… begins to look strange, unfamiliar, fragile. Even as Malek is executing his rules, laying down hexagons mechanically, line by line, shade by shade, his system is coming apart.”