PST ART is coming back with a bang. This time around, the city-spanning festivities will kick off with a massive public daytime fireworks show by artist Cai Guo-Qiang.
Previously known as Pacific Standard Time, PST ART is the every-few-years initiative funded by the J. Paul Getty Trust that calls for museums around the city to stage exhibitions covering a specific central theme. This fall’s shows, set to debut on September 15, will focus on how art and science collide.
The Getty—which also partakes in the exhibition roster—will kick things off outside of its own gallery walls with a fireworks installation on September 15 at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, the iconic former and future Olympic stadium and current home of USC football.
Rather than shooting off traditional pyrotechnics, WE ARE: Explosion Event for PST ART will employ bursts of organic pigments and dyes. Cai used a custom AI model to come up with the choreography that also requires the work of a thousand aerial drones.
“WE ARE will mark the first expansive daytime fireworks event featuring drone formation equipped with pyrotechnic products in U.S. history,” reads an official press release. Talk about a meeting of art and science.
The sure-to-be magnificent show will begin at dusk, when Angelenos in attendance will have the chance to be mesmerized by nearly 10 thousand twinkling mini firework shells installed throughout the seating bowl.
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“Today, as humanity grapples with the swift advancement of technologies epitomized by AI, culture and the arts appear particularly powerless,” the artist said in an official statement. “I hope WE ARE will stand as a grand gesture of the art world integrating the virtual with the real in the era of AI, and also as a powerful voice and decisive action in these turbulent times.”
But there’s more: The artist is also the focus of a separate exhibition at Pasadena’s USC Pacific Asia Museum based on the Getty’s scientific research into Cai’s gunpowder art. Titled “Cai Guo-Qiang: A Material Odyssey” the show is expected to fill up nearly the entire museum, featuring a vast selection of the artist’s work alongside scientific imagery exploring the nature of gunpowder and Cai’s process in using it.
Admission to WE ARE is free, though it’ll require tickets. The Getty says bookings will become available “later this summer” and suggests signing up for the PST ART newsletter for more details—but we’ll make sure to update this story, too, once we know more.