John Campbell: The LED Genius (Artist 2)

Some of John Campbell’s art is very ambiguous especially his “Ambiguous Icons” which was created by Light-Emitting Diodes (LEDs). The “Church of Fifth Avenue” depicts New York City’s life as pedestrians and traffic. The red LED background evokes tension and activates the pedestrians and traffic giving the appearance of the objects moving left to right; the red LEDs also foregrounded the people and traffic. I believe that this picture is very ambiguous and could have multiple meanings. The one message I pulled from this work was that no matter where in New York you are, you are consumed by the crowd and anxiety. From what I can tell, all of Campbell’s art revolves light and the effects that light can create. His first work was a picture of a lightbox (1990) and one of his most recent pieces of art work was (2003) was a photogravure suspended in front of LEDs to create a 25 minute video clip loop of moving images. Even though all his works are dealing with displaying his art with light and electronics, I hypothesize it is the process of making art that drives him.