Title: Code Breaker
Artist: Len van Zyl
Year: 2025
Medium: Acrylic on stretched canvas
Dimensions: 70 cm x 70 cm
Code Breaker explores the relationship between pattern, language, and interpretation—how meaning can be both constructed and obscured through visual systems. I layered geometric forms, text fragments, and stenciled motifs to create a rhythmic structure that feels both calculated and spontaneous. The composition reflects my fascination with coded communication, where symbols overlap and dissolve, inviting viewers to decipher what lies beneath.
The sharp angular shapes, vibrant palette, and shifting transparencies evoke the tension between precision and intuition—between the logic of design and the emotion of gesture. Code Breaker becomes a visual puzzle, a meditation on how we read, translate, and connect through signs and abstraction.
In Code Breaker (2025), Len van Zyl extends his exploration of visual language through the interplay of geometry, pattern, and abstraction. The composition merges crisp angular forms with layered stencils and vibrant color fields, creating a rhythm that feels simultaneously systematic and expressive. Drawing from the traditions of Geometric Abstraction and Pop-inflected Urban Art, van Zyl constructs a dynamic surface where structure and spontaneity coexist. The work suggests an encrypted dialogue—symbols, fragments, and marks functioning as both design and meaning. Code Breaker invites the viewer to engage in active interpretation, transforming pure abstraction into a meditation on perception and understanding.
