WE ARE: Explosion Event for PST ART

A spectacular realization of Art & Science Collide, PST ART will open to the public with WE ARE: Explosion Event for PST ART, a monumental artwork by world-renowned artist Cai Guo-Qiang and his custom AI model cAI™ (pronounced AI Cai), newly commissioned by Getty. Presented by Getty in collaboration with the University of Southern California, WE ARE will take place at the iconic Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum on September 15.

Composed of daytime fireworks—a signature form of Cai’s art that uses organic, sustainable pigments and dyes rather than traditional pyrotechnics—WE ARE will mark the first expansive daytime firework event in U.S. history featuring a drone formation equipped with pyrotechnic products.

WE ARE will feature nearly ten thousand twinkling mini firework shells installed throughout the seating bowl of the Coliseum, custom-developed daytime fireworks, and choreographed drones carrying pyrotechnic products, which will transform the Coliseum, illuminating the skies above downtown LA. The result is a visual story full of mystery and wonder, igniting the sky with images that showcase the relationship between humanity and AI. WE ARE suggests a present-day parallel to the myth of Prometheus’s theft of fire from the gods, with AI’s reduced dimensionality seeming to reveal a “heavenly secret.”

“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.” – Cai Guo-Qiang

PST ART is presented by Getty. The lead sponsors supporting PST ART are Bank of America, Alicia Miñana & Rob Lovelace, and the Getty Patron Program. Additional support is provided by the Simons Foundation; Eva & Ming Hsieh, Co-Founders of Fulgent Genetics; and Peggy & Andrew Cherng, Co-Chairs and Co-CEOs of Panda Express. Major support for WE ARE is provided by Yan Luo, Ellen & Dominic Ng, Haiyan Ren, Elizabeth Segerstrom, and Sophia & Anqiang Zhang.

(opens in a new tab)Southern California’s landmark arts event, PST ART, returns in September 2024 with more than 70 exhibitions from museums and other institutions across the region, all exploring the intersections of art and science, both past and present. Dozens of cultural, scientific, and community organizations will join the latest edition, PST ART: Art & Science Collide, with exhibitions on subjects ranging from ancient cosmologies to Indigenous sci-fi, and from environmental justice to artificial intelligence. Art & Science Collide will share groundbreaking research, create indelible experiences for the public, and generate new ways of understanding our complex world. For more information about PST ART: Art & Science Collide, please visit pst.art(opens in a new tab)(opens in a new tab)