The Joshua Light Show

The Joshua Light Show, created by Joshua White, was one of the trailblazing liquid light shows. It was renowned for its psychedelic art and served as a lighting backdrop behind many live band performances during the late 1960's and early 1970's.

Founder, Joshua White, studied electrical engineering, theatrical lighting, and magic lantern techniques at Carnegie Tech and also film making at University of Southern California. The rest of the group consisted of Thomas Shoesmith and William Schwarzbach, who met at Columbia University, Cecily Hoyt and Jane Ablemnan who were both art persons. JLS performed mostly out of the Fillmore in Manhattan and also other surrounding areas of New York City. Performances would be held shows every weekend and sometimes would reach crowds up to ten thousand people. After a weekend’s performance the group would nearly obtain equal revenue as the Who, the Doors, and the Jimi Hendrix Experience. The light shows would consist of multiple image-making devices to create their unique visual experience. Some of the equipment they used was film projectors, slide projectors, overhead projectors, color wheels, watercolors, oil colors, and glass crystals. These all would be arranged on two levels for their performances. The Joshua Light Show based their shows from four elements; projection of pure color, concrete imagery, variety of color effects and shaping of the light.

References

• Joshua White, "The Joshua Light Show"
• The Joshua Light Show Live at The Kitchen

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