Thousands of LEDs to light up SF-Oakland Bay Bridge
Tech Industry
-Above San Francisco Bay last night, the Bay Bridge sparkled and shimmered, shifting patterns of light moving across the nearly 2-miles span.
On a balcony nearby, artist Leo Villareal creates from his laptop using software to sculpt patterns of light.
-Really, I guess my goal is to create a communal experience.
The piece almost becomes like a digital campfire.
The people can gather around.
-He is
putting the final touches on Bay Lights, a work of art and will be officially turned on tonight.
Villareal's constantly changing light sculpture will run for the next two years.
-It's as if the wires they are alive.
It does bring a real sense of life and animation to the bridge.
-Electricians endured four months of cold night attaching 25,000 LED lights on the bridge's cables.
It's transforming the Bay Bridge that opened to acclaim
in 1936, but was quickly overshadowed when the more elegant, Golden Gate opened five months later.
For more than 75 years, the Golden Gate has been a show horse.
The Bay Bridge, a work house.
-The bridges do have a slight rivarly.
You know, this is a really hard-working brige, 280,000 trips a day.
We do all the heavy liftings and I think everyone feels the same way that this beautiful work of humanity has it's moment to shine.
-Ben Davis lead the fund-raising for the $8 million
project and brought in Villareal, an artist already recognized for a large scale light sculptures but never anything this big.
-It doesn't require an art degree or anything else.
It just requires being a human to really appreciate it.
-So many people are expected to appreciate it.
It's projected to generate nearly a $100 million in the local economy and become a tourist attaction to rival the Golden Gate, at least at night.
For CBS this morning, John Blackstone in San Francisco.
