For four years, Alex Proba created one digital poster a day, a discipline that shaped her distinctively bold and playful style. Along the way, she invited her audience to submit personal memories, which she translated into digital artworks, ultimately completing 1,460 posters before the “A Poster a Day” project concluded in 2017. Since then, her practice has expanded across a range of mediums.
“Echoes of the Infinite,” created in collaboration with SolidNature, explores the interplay of past and present
Born in Germany to a family of doctors who fled communism in Poland, Proba’s early life was rooted in structure and science, but creativity threaded its way in through her grandmother, a retired florist. “The only color in my life was my grandma,” she says. Summers spent painting florals and nature motifs with her set a contrast to the minimalist household she grew up in.
At 15, an exchange program brought Proba to Ohio, where she lived with a former fashion designer, an experience that awakened her artistic curiosity. Back in Germany, she initially pursued medical studies but pivoted to spatial design at AMD Akademie Mode & Design in Hamburg, followed by contextual design at the Design Academy Eindhoven in the Netherlands. “I followed my gut,” she says.
After graduating, Proba moved to New York, holding roles at companies like Kickstarter and Nike while launching StudioPROBA in 2013. By 2018, she took it full time. Today, based in Portland, Oregon with an outpost in New York, her practice spans murals, furniture, textiles, pools, sculptures, and brand collaborations—all unified by a vibrant aesthetic rooted in joy and intuition.
Proba’s mural at the GRT Architects-crafted Alba LA restaurant spans four garden arches, painted in a Venetian plaster-style
Her colorful interventions have transformed hospitality spaces, too, like Alba in Los Angeles, the Manner hotel in New York, and the Standard Residences in Miami, among others. Her public artworks—defined by color, pattern, and scale—bring the same spirit to city streets and communal environments. Recent commissions include permanent sculptures in Surrey, Canada and a temporary installation at the Giza pyramids in Egypt, each shaped by site-specific storytelling.
Here, Proba shares what goes into bringing her vibrant art to life.
How did you find your distinctive style?
Alex Proba: As a teenager, I painted flowers. Now, most of my shapes and patterns are still derived from the natural world—it’s an abstracted way of doing what I was doing as a child. A lot of the color and pattern clashes are from within me and from my grandma. I found my true style in the four-year “A Poster a Day” project because I had to create something every single day. By the fourth year, you could tell that I created those.
You recently installed permanent sculptures in Surrey, Canada.
AP: The idea was to incorporate the Punjabi culture into the sculptures, which is one of the predominant cultures in Surrey. I had a conversation with poet [Keerat Kaur] who wrote poems specifically for that location, and I translated them into my pieces. They draw from important elements of Punjabi culture—from family and belonging to fertility.
A Punjabi-inspired installation in Surrey, Canada
What inspired the temporary installation at the Pyramids of Giza in Egypt?
AP: I worked with stone supplier SolidNature, which works on projects that go outside the norm of what people think they can do with stone. The design and concept is mine, but we worked together to figure out what each stone represents, which ones have the right veining and form, what fits to the site itself, and which balance out the pyramids without taking away from them.
I collaborated with nature versus applying colors or patterns. I let the colors and the patterns speak for themselves—the veining and marbling in the stone is the pattern of time. There’s a lot of Egyptian mythology in it. The sculpture with the circle in the middle represents the Eye of Horus. The “donut” is a portal looking out on the pyramids and a portal into the past and into the future. But there are also references to my work—for instance the petal, which is a recognizable shape in my work. It’s a mixture of the two worlds. We made three sculptures that you can walk through, and they’re positioned in between the pyramids, so if you look straight at them, it looks like they’re all intertwined. It’s organic and geometric—they do a dance together.
What is your creative process like?
AP: I go directly into sketching as if it’s the final design. Most of the time what I sketch first is the one I end up going with. If there’s a client or a brand involved and they say they don’t like yellow, I’ll change the yellow. But then they will eventually go with yellow. Often, they go back to the original, which proves that the most intuitive one is always the right one. People often ask me how I put colors together, and I couldn’t tell you. I know when it feels right.
A mural by Proba complements Studio Collective’s fresh and airy design of Hotel June in Los Angeles
Was there a recent source of inspiration that felt especially powerful?
AP: My daughter—making her. We went through IVF for a long time. Wanting something deeply and overcoming all the hurdles makes it even greater. That experience with my daughter makes everything possible.
What is your dream project?
AP: I’ve designed it but haven’t done it yet: playgrounds. They are often sad or the same, and there’s so much potential to make them like Alice in Wonderland—functional, inspirational, fun, with shapes and characters. I’m talking to nonprofit organizations like Inclusion Matters, which are building inclusive playgrounds. It’s amazing that they make them inclusive, because that’s a big miss on a lot of playgrounds. My goal is to make them into dreamscapes.
What is your overall mission when creating art?
AP: I make art to make people happy and create joy. From a public sculpture that anyone can explore to a hotel mural, I’m trying to reach a bigger audience than just the art lovers. I want to touch any human who happens upon it.
In collaboration with Ceramica Suro, more than 8,000 tiles comprise a custom pool
This article originally appeared in HD’s December 2025 issue.
