"... An artist named Elias Romero, who had been making light art with an overhead projector at an old church on Capp Street in the Mission District, was invited by playwright and director Lee Breuer to create light projections for a play call “The Run” at the San Francisco Tape Music Center. Romero’s projections were somewhat abstract, kind of landscape-ish... There was no precedent for making art with an overhead projector that I was aware of, other than what Elias was doing. Elias worked in a controlled, minimal, almost poetic manner.... With the help of Bob Cohen, who had been an electrician in New York, I put together a homemade sound system from parts I had torn out of an old television console, including its record player. Elias had an LP of “Carmina Burana,” so for our first and only collaboration, we played the record and took turns on the overhead projector....
"In a way, it wasn’t about creating light shows as much as it was coming up with a whole new approach to painting. Typically, an artist paints something in a studio, waits for it to dry, and then, when he’s got a bunch of paintings, invites people to his studio or a gallery for a show. When you are painting with light, if people aren’t there, nobody sees it. It was present-tense art, in which composition, execution, and observation were simultaneous. That changed the relationships between the painter, the painting, and the viewer.
"... Overhead projectors were used mostly in educational settings, for corporate meetings, that sort of thing. We repurposed them. The main medium of the overhead projector had been the transparency. The light source below the projector’s flat surface, which is actually a Fresnel lens, would beam the image or words on the transparency onto a mirror above, which, in turn, aimed that image through a focusing lens and onto a screen or wall. Transparencies are dry, but we were projecting liquids, so the first things we needed to do were to protect the lens with a clear sheet of glass and then contain the liquids. Early on, Elias had discovered that clock crystals—the clear pieces of glass that protect a clock’s hands and other moving parts—made good bowls for light-show liquids. They came in all shapes and sizes. Those that were deeply concave held more liquid. Others were flatter, which allowed you to do different things to the liquids. Some crystals with round bottoms could actually be spun in circles on the projector’s flat surface. And then, by setting one bowl on top of another, you could stack them up, several at a time, to produce even more effects, liquid- and color-wise."
- Bill Ham, interviewed in Collector's Weekly
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