Recently, the brick exterior of the London School of Economics library has been turned into an urban light show: Bluerain. It's the work of San Francisco sculptor and installation artist Michael Brown, and will be officially unveiled Tuesday.

Bluerain, which consists of 23,520 glowing blue light-emitting diode (LED) lights, works like this:

As students check out books at the library's front desk or search for information on computers, the titles of their desired books and the subject headers of their search results will be broadcast live. The artistic strategy is that so many searches and loans are made in real time that the words overlap, and the blue lights make a pretty pattern - like shimmering blue rain.

The first time I saw a light-emitting diode was at a garage sale. I was in grade school. Growing up in Riverside, there were a lot of people who worked in the aircraft industry, and I remember reaching into this box of electronic parts and picking up a clear diode. I plugged it in and was instantly fascinated by its shape, continuous steady illumination, color, and energy efficiency. I've been playing with light ever since.

As I got older and realized my art and design ideas could team up with one another, I became interested in using light and staging to create my own distinctive interactive environments. My parents were kind and perceptive enough to realize that I needed a "set." Every fall when my dad took his annual two-week hunting trip, he'd clean out the double-car garage, providing me free rein to design elaborate haunted houses for Halloween. The whole neighborhood would show up; it became an annual event. I remember the power generated by collaborating space with lights, theme, and a purpose, and came to realize the effect it had on me and a broader audience.

(While in London) I began to envision blue lights, lots of them, on the side of a building to create a shimmering cascade of light that would draw people to the artwork. And only when they are sufficiently intimate with the installation do they realize that the diodes reflect the work taking place inside the library. Bluerain would be created and devoted to the outgrowth of the student's own research.

The great thing about LEDs is that they last an incredibly long time. The estimated lifespan of the ones used in Bluerain are 50,000 hours of continuous illumination. You will notice that more often than not, each individual LED is actually "off" or dark, only glowing when a letter rolls by.

Everything for Bluerain is customized, from the Kelly font (named for a close friend) to the custom die cut for the modules. The hoods on each cluster have an angular design in order to create a shadow drop similar to that on a traffic light. When the sunlight hits it, a shadow is created that projects luminescence rather than washed-out color.

Bluerain - a gift of San Francisco's Darril Hudson, a London School of Economics graduate - went through a lot of bureaucratic hurdles in Britain. There were also some Queen's English moments. Once I said to an IT guy in reference to an early-on glitch in the software, "There is a wrench in the plan." He didn't understand me, so I had to explain precisely two nouns: wrench and cliche. He said, "Oh, we call 'wrenches' spanners and we say, 'There is a spanner in the plan.' "

Bluerain is eco-friendly. The total working consumption is about 60 watts. I was blown away when we first measured it. I knew it would be low, but 60 watts was completely impressive, especially when I saw how bright my studio was when I had it running. I had to hide Bluerain's components behind cardboard just so I could sleep!

Even up close, Bluerain verges on unreadable shifting hieroglyphics, but by turning your head you can decipher the words by following individual blocks of text. There will be a lot of students cricking their necks to look up at my work. I often joke how I am in cahoots with local chiropractors for a cut of their revenue. Being exposed to art allows one to see different points of view - or just see things from a different perspective. And I am hoping the temporary neck pain will be worth it for my British fans. My parents have never traveled outside of the United States. And I am treating them to a trip to London. To think that it all started with a garage sale and haunted houses.