AlexP 

Sym 

On view Nov. 3–12

Uithoorn, The Netherlands 

Sym is an interactive installation with which audiences use a flashlight like a paintbrush to create temporary, light-based artworks. Each brush stroke you make will transform into ever-changing symmetrical patterns, glowing with vibrant colors and shapes. The concept for Sym was inspired by “light painting,” where the artist uses light to make a drawing in the air around them as a camera captures the light and transforms it into a drawing through a long exposure photograph. Sym utilizes technology to bring “light painting” to the next level by allowing the painter to not only see their work appear immediately on the screen in front of them but also by integrating generative patterns that activate with each new stroke of the flashlight. By playing with light, the viewer becomes the artist, using Sym as the canvas. Step into the installation, pick up your flashlight, and let your inner artist shine! 

Biography 

AlexP is Alex Prooper and Simone van Dam, and their studio is based in the Netherlands. Prooper is a digital media artist. He studied physics but ended up in the software industry more than 35 years ago. Prooper started to focus more and more on making art through his own developed software, and he has been working as a full-time artist for more than 10 years. Van Dam has studied at the Academy of Visual Arts in Amsterdam and has been working with Prooper for the past 15 years. The art of AlexP is always technical but often based on or derived from natural phenomena. AlexP examines systems and the patterns and behavior as a result of these systems, often involving the spectator in the system of the work of art, making it interactive. AlexP shows at festivals, art exhibitions, galleries, and museums, including Light City in Baltimore, Maryland; Amsterdam Light Festival; Amsterdam Dance Event; Youth Film Festival; and Kröller-Müller Museum in Otterlo, The Netherlands.