To Do Saturday: GLOW @ Santa Monica Pier (7pm-7am)
By Ryan - Friday July 18th 2008 |
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No plans this Saturday? Lordy! Get thee to the World Famous Santa Monica Pier for GLOW, an all-night art-and-sound extravaganza free to the public. Dublab, Machine Project, KCRW DJs Garth, Raul and Jeremy Sole, our buddy Karyl Newman and a slew of additional international audio and visual artists of note will be out in full force from dusk ’til dawn, transforming the traditionally tourist-, corn dog- and seagull-choked pier area into an artistic wünderland (albeit one with slight, unmistakable yet not altogether unpleasant whiffs of tourists, seagulls and corn dogs) for some 12-odd hours. So what’s Karyl up to Saturday?
Using the stairs that connect the north side of the pier to the beach, Newman will place LEDs under the stair treads and program them to change color and rhythm in response to changes in the tide.
Count me in and do let me top off your mushroom tea, my good sir. Meantime, what’s Machine Project up to across the way?
Ferris Wheel Orchestra
A 3-part musical composition/cycle for brass, winds and percussion to be performed from the baskets of the ferris wheel. The first part will be performed at 8:30 PM, the second at midnight, and the final part at 5:30 AM on July 20th.
Totally not for me. Any poets?
Poetry Boat
A boat with three poets (Joshua Beckman, Anthony McCann and Noelle Kocot) will anchor at some distance offshore on the south side of the pier. On the beach, a site will be established to allow telephone contact between visitors and the boat. Visitors can request personal poetry readings that will be delivered from the boat.
Ok I’ll be there. Look for the man with a beard.
» Glow @ Santa Monica Pier Sat Jul 19
(Did we mention dublab?)
Did You Know?
GLOW is the only overnight event to have ever received permission to use the historic Santa Monica Pier. Make it count.
Update
Defamer interviews Santa Monica Cultural Affairs Manager Jessica Cusick regarding the origins of GLOW and what you should not miss, here
this looks sweet! all it needs is a rave!
Headed there now! Sounds freakin awesome.
Glow was a an utter failure of an event. All hype and no beef!! The organizers deserve a public slaying, since it was public funds that backed it.
I agree! glow was awful!
@3 & 4 – curious, what was your biggest disappointment – one of the installations? the traffic? people congestion? … I’ve heard a lot of reports of people not being able to park and/or find a shuttle. Had no problem getting in myself but did notice that they weren’t letting any foot traffic onto the pier around 230-3am. Not sure how long that lasted.
Anybody else have a good time or a disappointing time out there? Sound off.
The event was a joke. David was correct in saying the organizers deserve a public slaying. More thought went into the light routines on the new ferris wheel at the pier than to this event.
Ryan:
Problem #1 was that Santa Monica is not equipped to handle the number of cars that showed up Saturday night. Events like this should take place where a larger percentage of people will walk there (like Sunset Junction).
Problem #2 was that there wasn’t really very much going on. A few ok art installations, but other than that, where was the beef? I’m sure I missed a lot of the music and other performances, but there wasn’t a lot of signage to explain where people should go. The end result was that this huge crowd just sort of milled around and got wasted.
after attending HARD summer fest, i arrived at the pier at 5 am to find not much of anything going on. we planned on seeing the ferris wheel orchestra’s final performance, but supposedly security had cancelled all the final performances?!? also, though all of the advertisements, website, and kcrw commercials touted the event as an ALL-NIGHT festival like nuit blanche from 7-7, most of the art was completely shut down by 5. we couldn’t even find a bottle of water to buy.
we ended up participating in a spontaneous drum circle/ giant blue tarp being flapped up and down with lightsticks galore, which was beautiful but not officially part of the festival. glad i didn’t plan my night around this event.
i think glow 2 has hope though, we need more of this.
From what I heard, GLOW was a success. While there may not have been as much art as was hoped for, I heard this was the fault of city regulations, not the organizers of the event. Instead of criticizing the event organizers (who are actually doing something to promote public art), people who are interested in these events should focus their energy on asking the City to provide more funding and logistical support for even better events in the future.
If anyone deserves a “public slaying” it belongs to the people who posted the negative comments above. These are the type of people who only lift their finger to criticize the hard work of others, and who do nothing to promote art in their own community. I commend the efforts of everyone who worked hard to put together this event and I look forward to more like it in the future.
No one involved with GLOW needs a “public slaying”, but a public caning for this poorly-organized event may not be out of order.
When I got there (about 4 am) I saw some of the public art exhibits surrounded by sloppy drunks. By the time I made it to the Ferris Wheel for the musical performances, the security personnel had been telling the gathering crowds that they were cancelled.
The sad part was the only music after that was the competing drum circles and the boozy fights between people on the other side of the pier.
I’m all for supporting the type of event this was probably supposed to be, but it looked like a big drunken frat party with small children and trustafarians gone wild.
Good job, GLOW.
This event was a complete sham to inject money into the businesses in Santa Monica. They claimed that all the shops on Third Street Promenade were going to stay open late, what a bunch of BS that turned out to be. The only establishments that stayed open late were liquer shops and restaurants.
The “art” was limited and the majority of the projects consisted of looping videos from a projecter. One video projected on the side of the old Robinsons May was setup on a construction scissor lift – pathetic. TVs inside of the cannons along Ocean was poorly thought out. The water display was interesting, but noting spectacular considering I have seen much better renditions over 20 years ago.
I humped by photography equipment and I didnt even bother setting up. Countless people approached me throughout the night to ask where was the show?
You know its a corporate sham when Kohler, Starbucks, Barcardi Rum show up to push their crap. Even the GLOW information booth was pushing their worthless items.
One of the worst events I have ever been to. The people in Santa Monica that agreed to take advantage of the public in this manner should be fired.
Thanks for the feedback, keep it coming. Personally I don’t consider glow a sham; I thought it was a good first step on SaMo’s part and was impressed they pulled off as much as they did. I think like with anything else, you get out of it what you put into it. So for the sake of balance, I just googled the event. This guy and this guy both have a handful of great photos, and I found a very positive, comprehensive review of one person’s night here.
Attended the Glow Event. Got to the Pier around 9:30pm.
Criticism: A few cool displays to see (ie. under the pier & the water screen on the beach). But overall, for a festival of “art” I was sorely desiring more robust content. After a few hours I was done with it.
Kudos: Congrats for Santa Monica having an all night event. It brought out tons of people. And the businesses on the pier where definitely maxing out their businesses.
I went expecting the sort of light displays I had seen in pictures of nuit blanche in France–large scale projections that you can wander around looking at. Not the sort of individualized, wait in line to see sorts of things that they had for the most part. An event with 44k people and one little glowing bouncy castle that you have to wait in line for and was shut down when I walked past due to someone getting a twisted ankle? It was as if they expected hundreds instead of thousands of people to show up.
In general it just wasn’t worth the effort it took to get there, move through the crowds, etc.
Ok there’s Burningman intensity of Ph.D. level
and then there’s Glow barely level of kindergarten.
I should have gone to the rave in san gabriel – the Awakening!!
HATE HATE HATE HATE!
GOOD JOB HATERS! YOU BUNCH OF COMPLAINING ASS PUSSIES ARE HATING SO GOOD ON THE GLOW FEST! KEEP THE HATE ALIVE!
I have to concur, what was promised would have been amazing, but what was delivered was pretty ho-hum. I think it was a triple cluster-fuck of too many people showing up, too many events ending early or being blocked from even happening, and too little intelligence put into the art that was there. I mean, really, images projected onto sprays of water is Disney/Bellagio shit. And that white pile of giant penne pasta looked like something left over from Coachella four years ago. And the igloo thing floating out in the water with glow sticks in it was practically invisible from any vantage point.
Admittedly, there may have been totally awesome stuff that we missed; because of the swarms of people clogging the tube running under the pier, my crew never left the side of the pier we were on. I’d really wanted to see the pirate sea chanty people, but never heard the single strain of a concertina. And when young people kept asking us to sell them drugs, well, it just goes to show that Santa Monica doesn’t have the industrious go-getters our L.A. kids are used to!
Burningman would teach all of you how this could have been done and worked! All participants, no spectators! Too many people figure they will just get drunk or high and something really cool will walk in front of them, you have to be part of your environment at least a little. Burningman keeps some 50,000 people interacting 24 hours a day for a week! I didnt go to this event knowing what it would turn out like and it did just that! It has a lot to do with the public laziness and their lathargic need to be entertained. Isnt that what TV has done to us? Move away from your tv, video games, computers and dope occasionally and create something with your friends! Tell tale signs-Santa Monica Pier, after dark, free, what did you think would happen there? Dont get me wrong, it could work. Get the artists that were there, cuz they tried, and some better organized leaders, a plan, map, some good city people, some private security and safety people and info rangers and some nice vendors…….etc
C’mon.Lets face it FREE!!!! hmmm – Burningman costs money & effort to go to – All I have to say it was FREE!!!! & it is in the summer time & all the schools are out & it was FREE!!!!
I did not go because it was FREE!!!
what a waste of time. To the person who said we should blame the city not the promoters should really reconsider. If the city wouldn’t let them put on the event they wanted to why put on a crippled poor attempt? It was a waste of everyones time and gas money. Worst event of the year.
I had a great time at Glow. I rode my bike there. I think anyone who didnt is insane or just gluttons for punishment.
The art was pretty cool-some kinda whateves but some, like the robotic fish under the pier, was fascinating. I didnt go in having any expectations so I was able to enjoy Santa Monica as it was transformed into an all night art/ music event. I dont know when Glow will return but I hope soon and that it spans over a couple days. Good times!
My friend I were there for two hours and we did not not see any art.
Even the “information” booth could not say anything but “go down to the sand”
I would like to be supportive and not a hater but I did not see anything from 1:30am-3:30am.
I held the brochure in my hand and looked up all the hype again to make sure I wasn’t dreaming the promotion.
One great step for all-night-art in Santa Monica, one great leap for people figuring out that they should ride their bike to LA area events.