How Many Conservators Does It Take to Change a Lightbulb?

The first time Rachel Rivenc saw Flux Light Kit, she studied its quirky, six-pronged shape topped by a mirrored orb and wondered: what exactly is this supposed to do?

The piece consisted of seven lightbulbs connected to a central hub—a DIY-style lamp, you might figure. But as Rivenc, head of conservation and preservation at the Getty Research Institute, soon discovered, this was no ordinary lamp. Piecing together how to turn it on and how to preserve its decades-old bulbs took Rivenc on an unexpected journey through a small but enthusiastic community of lightbulb enthusiasts.

The Getty Research Institute acquired the light, created in the 1970s by Fluxus artist Robert Watts, in 1985. But it wasn’t until 30 years later when the piece would go on view, that Rivenc had to figure out how it worked.

Right away, Rivenc realized she needed to dig deeper into Watts’s piece to figure out how to bring it back to life.

Turning the Lights On

First, Rivenc had to figure out if the bulbs on Flux Light Kit still worked, so she enlisted the help of Getty electrician Vlad Slavin. Rivenc, Slavin, and his team of electricians tested each bulb one by one. Out of all the lightbulbs, only one didn’t work.

“We found out that it does all kinds of interesting things,” Rivenc said. Each of the bulbs featured different shapes, colors, and effects, for example one is a flickering flame. Another has a magnet that makes the filament move and look almost like it’s dancing.

However, Rivenc feared that turning it on and displaying it all day, every day throughout the four-month-long exhibition could cause the antique lightbulbs to burn out.

“One immediate thought I had when I saw the piece plugged in was, how amazing it is that these bulbs still work, but also, they have a limited lifespan,” Rivenc said. “They have a great artistic and historical value, and we don’t want to just burn them up during the course of one exhibition.”

Searching for Bulbs

Rivenc, in consultation with exhibition curator Marcia Reed and the Robert Watts estate, decided to try to produce a copy of the piece for the exhibition, so the Research Institute could conserve and protect the original lightbulbs while still showing Flux Light Kit to exhibition visitors. The first step was to figure out exactly what type of bulbs they were.

Research showed that one lightbulb is incandescent, one is a rare Sylvania mood glow, and five are called neon glow discharge lamps. These bulbs contain electrodes and noble gas that glow when charged with an electric current. Argon gas glows purple, neon gas glows orange, and a mixture of both glows pink. Glow lamps with bulbs like these were produced in the US throughout the 1930s-70s.

Watts, who was also a mechanical engineer, frequently perused vintage stores along Canal Street in New York City, and used what he found in his artwork. That may be where he found the bulbs for Flux Light Kit. Fluxus artists like Watts sought to disrupt the status quo of the art world by changing the process of making art and rethinking what art could be. They often incorporated humor, chance, spontaneity, everyday objects, and ephemeral materials like paper (or lightbulbs!), into their art, creating works meant to be touched and interacted with.

Rivenc initially wondered if she could commission new lightbulbs. She reached out to neon artist Dani Bonnet to learn more about the process. But remaking the bulbs ultimately didn’t seem in line with the ethos of Fluxus and its focus on everyday objects rather than high art. Through Bonnet, Rivenc connected with a network of neon artists that eventually led her to Andrew Oxner, a lightbulb collector based in Reno, Nevada.

Lightbulbs In Reno

Among the trees that dot Oxner’s one-acre property in the desert south of Reno, Nevada sit 40- and 50-foot storage containers filled with lightbulbs. Two hundred and fifty thousand lightbulbs, to be exact, ranging from the end of the 19th century to today. A mechanical engineer by trade (just like Watts), Oxner spends his free time hunting down bulbs. He hunts on websites like eBay and befriends lightbulb retailers who call him when they need to clean out their warehouses.

Oxner’s passion for lightbulbs began in 1984, when he was 10 years old. Back then, he carefully nestled his bulbs in his sock drawer. His collection long ago outgrew his bedroom, but he’s still fascinated by this world-changing innovation.

“I've been interested in the lightbulb because it's the symbol of invention, but it's also brought with it a number of problems. Everything from greenhouse gas emissions to long working hours arguably have at least some relationship to the lightbulb,” Oxner said. “It's both a solution and a problem, all encapsulated into a neat little package.”

Rivenc sent Oxner photos of Flux Light Kit, and Oxner searched through his collection to find as many bulbs as he could that matched the ones in Watts’s piece. He ended up loaning twelve bulbs to Getty for Flux Light Kit: flicker flame neon bulbs that appear to have a tiny fire dancing inside the glass; neon glow lamps from GE’s “Nightlight” series; Bal-a-fire Flicker bulbs, which use carbon filaments and a magnet to create a vibrating effect; and the Sylvania mood glow bulb.

“This is really one of the first times that someone has approached me from a museum with a serious interest in a curatorial type of purpose,” Oxner said. “Most of the time the lightbulbs stay stored away in cardboard boxes, and some of them are still in their original socks. So I need to get them out.”

Rivenc also scoured eBay and found more bulbs: incandescent bulbs, a few neon and argon glow lamps and some flicker flame neon bulbs (a replacement for a 1930s bulb from the Birdseye Electric Co. remains elusive). These bulbs, plus the selection from Oxner, allowed Flux Light Kit to be displayed without using any of the original lightbulbs.