Zach Lieberman What Light
May Be

The works begin with observation. Lieberman studies the ways light interacts with different materials, from metal and lenticular lenses to iridescent film. He translates these observations into code, where behaviors can be exaggerated, combined, or pushed beyond what physical materials allow.

The geometry is simple: lines, grids, boxes, and curves. The complexity comes from how light interacts with these forms. Here, light takes on qualities of a physical material. It appears to have edges, volume and weight, without solid boundaries. It leaks and blends. Light becomes the object itself.

The eye completes the work. Some of what we see comes from the image itself, and some from our own perception: vibrating edges, colors that seem to separate, and forms that linger like afterimages. These effects aren’t just part of the image. They happen as we look.

For more than a decade, Lieberman has maintained a practice of making daily sketches in software. Across thousands of experiments, ideas recur, mutate, and branch into new directions. The fifty-six smaller works offer a glimpse into this ongoing process, while nine large prints bring selected experiments to a new scale and a series of animations unfolds them over time.

Abraham Palatnik and Gottfried Jäger offer important historical precedents. In the 1950s, Palatnik used mechanical systems to compose light, color, and movement. In the 1960s, Jäger used photographic rules to make images without depicting the visible world. Like these artists, Lieberman uses systems to shape light, but computation allows him to go further: rewriting the very rules that govern its behavior.