GLOW

A few weekends ago, a friend and I went to GLOW, an outdoor, all-night, arts festival held in Santa Monica, CA.  Although not what I had originally anticipated,  glow embodied the type of integration of the public space, art, entertainment and community in a city I feel typically is unconcerned with this fusion.

As I've mentioned in previous blog posts, doing anything in Los Angeles is contingent on ones access to transportation, the most convenient being a car.  One major issue Los Angeles has, that all of my friends who come from somewhere other than Los Angeles, and even those who have lived here their whole life, complain about how difficult it is to get around without a car, and getting from West LA to East is a feat that, if lucky, takes 2 hours and a couple confusing transfers (all of which is a topic for another blog post.)  Going from USC to Santa Monica would have been really difficult (and even with a car, it was somewhat inconvenient to the increased traffic caused by the event and also the cost of parking....argh.) In fact, one of the reasons why I decided to attend Glow was because my roommate (who does not own a car...or a drivers license) asked me for a ride.

We arrived, and were greeting with a huge projection of the event title: Glow (in case that wasn't made clear.) My first reaction was: "wow. hipster central."  because it was totally hipster central (sort of similar to the crowd at Cinespia) which isn't a bad thing, just an observation....and I guess that's a bit hypocritical because my mom thinks I am a hipster.

I guess I should explain a little bit about what glow is (because going in, I actually wasn't completely sure what it was.)  Here's a blurb from the event organizers:

Glow 2010 will commission 20 original artworks specifically for this one-night event.  Artists include Anne Bray (Los Angeles),  Céleste Boursier-Mougenot (Séte, France), Rafael Lozano-Hemmer (Montreal, Canada), Yoshua Okón (Mexico City) and Steve Roden (Los Angeles) .  In addition to these five internationally known artists, an additional fifteen artists were selected through an open-call to artists in Los Angeles County.  An important component of Glow’s programming includes the Glow Network, an affiliation with organizations in Los Angeles that are engaged in unusual and/or locally-based arts and culture activities.  This year Glow is partnering with 18th Street Art Center, Freewaves, LAND and Machine Project to jointly curate and commission projects.

 I really think it would have helped me to know this coming in because I just sort of stumbled onto the beach and the works of art that happened to be there...which was confusing.  Exhibit A (no pun intended):

foam coming out of a lifeguard tower.  What did it mean?  I still don't know.  My favorite comment on this piece was from an overheard conversation (which I happened to record...but can't seem to upload,)  and I quote:
    girl #1: What is this?
    girl #2: I guess it's art?

You don't know how relieved I was to hear someone else saying this.  I still don't know what that piece was about but I had a strong urge to play in the foam..but I couldn't! They roped off the freaking thing.

Exhibit B:

that guy's having a good time.
If I were to describe this exhibit, in layman's terms, it was like watching a grown man finger paint with his...feces...and having those 30-60 seconds repeated on a loop. Therapeutic for some (see above image,) boring for others (see me.)  Again, I wish I knew the background.


As I was walking between the exhibitions, I found myself wondering what the intent of this entire exhibition was.  This is a biannual event, but it feels like an ongoing experiment of trying to bring the community into, what often times feels like, an extremely elitist world: Art.  One step lower and closer to the people than a museum is (mainly just because of the form and location in which the exhibition took place) but I don't think it's form contributed to the level of engagement in terms the breaking of barriers between the work and its surroundings, the work its spectator and the spectators with each other.)  This notion of spectators I think is a key term because I think what glow tries to do is transform traditional spectators into participants, which I don't think was fully achieved.

Engagement with the art itself was difficult (except for one special installation that I will mention later) because the art that I wanted to interact with was roped off, and the art that I could interact with was not stimulating. On top of that,  I felt very self conscious during my entire experience.  First, I felt I should have known what was going on.   Second, glow felt like a place where people went under the guise of appreciating art, but were actually really looking at each other. Which is completely acceptable and perhaps the one of the points of exhibitions, in public or private spaces...and the point of public spaces in general: people-watching. I guess what is lacking the most is the other side to this action of observing which would be interaction.  This, I can't really blame on anyone because I myself am guilty of not wanting to interact and failing to do so, even in an environment which I am aware wants me to interact.  As I previously mentioned, I had the feeling of being watched by others, but I also was very aware of the fact that I was observing others, how they were dressed, who they were with, how it seemed they were responding to the art, etc.  Glow was not so much about the art, it was about the people who went.  I viewed the people around me with the similar kind of distance I viewed the art around me.

The one exception I found to this was:

a music/performance piece where people were allowed to cross over the roped of boundary and participate with the musicians and dancers in their performance.  I felt this to be the most successful exhibit because it was the only one that was able to break the barrier between the spectator and the participant.  Even as a spectator and refusing to actively participate, it was the one exhibit I found not only interesting and exciting, but engaging, even solely as a spectator because it felt less like and exhibit and more like an experience.

....um

the end.