In the graduation project The Light Sees Me, Kees de Gooijer (Interdisciplinary Arts, Maastricht Academy of Fine Arts) starts from a personal question: how can earlier versions of ourselves continue to exist alongside us, rather than fading behind us? The work understands this as a moment of closeness, a state in which different versions of the self coexist side by side.
The Light Sees Me is an immersive installation that explores the relationship between nostalgia, perception, and the presence of a younger self within the present moment.
The project departs from a personal question: how can earlier versions of ourselves remain beside us, rather than behind us? The work understands it as a moment of proximity, a condition in which different versions of the self coexist. Through light, scale, movement, and atmosphere, the installation creates a spatial journey that invites visitors into this process. Entering through a corridor transformed by motion-reactive light, visitors move through an environment in which subtle shifts in colour, brightness, and rhythm respond to their presence. A suspended sculptural figure at the entrance acts as a silent narrator, establishing a sense of being observed rather than simply observing.
Light plays a central role within the work. Moments from personal childhood memories: concert lights cutting through darkness, sunsets stretching time, flickering streetlights at night, form the emotional foundation of the project. At the end of the installation,imagery and fragments of childhood film material create a quieter moment of reflection, grounding the work in its personal origin while leaving space for individual interpretation.
The Light Sees Me offers an invitation into one person’s process of staying close to a childhood self, and asks how light can hold that presence in the present.
Date 20 - 22 May
Location Bureau Europa, platform voor architectuur en design
Admission free