John Rosenbaum (September 3, 1934^[1] – September 30, 2003) was an American physicist, educator^[2] and kinetic sculptor,^[3] associated with the San Francisco Renaissance^[4][5] and the counterculture of the 1960s.

Rosenbaum was born on September 3, 1934, in Brigantine, New Jersey. He attended Cornell University,^[6][7] where he graduated with a degree in engineering physics in 1957.^[8]

After graduated from Cornell University in 1957, Rosenbaum moved to the San Francisco Bay Area in the early 1960s, where he contributed to the Harvard Project Physics textbooks.^[9] He was associated with the free school movement in the 1960s, and was a colleague of the educator Herbert Kohl,^[10] who described Rosenbaum's educational work in his book The Open Classroom^[11][12] and Math, Writing & Games in the Open Classroom.^[13] He designed the Xylopipes xylophone children's toy for Creative Playthings.^[14][15]

Rosenbaum created "Light Boxes",^[16][17] kinetic sculptures using polarized light and layers of cellophane laminated between pairs of rotating glass disks, producing changing patterns and colors similar to, and on a smaller scale than, light shows projected at rock concerts in the 1960s. He was exhibited by the Landau Gallery^[18] in Beverly Hills, among others.^{[19][20][21][22]} He was a colleague of silk screen artist Arthur Okamura. He designed the original logo for Herbie Mann's Embryo Records.

• 1969 Felix Landau Gallery, Los Angeles^[18]
• 1975 Walnut Creek, California (with Arthur Okamura)^[23][24]

Rosenbaum died in Alameda, California, on September 30, 2003, from complications of Parkinson's disease.^[25]

• Examples of the optical effects used in "Light Boxes":
• sugar syrup solution placed between 2 linear polarizers, producing 3 primary colors Archived June 27, 2010, at the Wayback Machine
• multiple examples of color produced from polarized light and clear plastics