It seems that most of the people complaining: didn't listen to instructions and drove their car; find 1 mile of walking to be excessive; can't see a 3 ft wide balloon 12 feet in the air; and didn't see most of the art. Glow 2010 was fabulous! How often do you get to see world class art for free on a gorgeous beach? Each site was clearly marked by a large glowing balloon and easy to find. At the opening ceremony at least 5 volunteers/staff stuffed programs into my hand and I saw staff all night long handing out programs on the beach. All of my personal art installations were south of the pier: - The flashing DNA helix that interacted with the crowd sounds was random yet really interesting to watch. - The bridge of light that led people down to the beach was spectacular - you get narrowed down into a light corrider and then emerge right at the waves. - I laughed for 10 minutes at the perfomances being done in the Karaoke tent and the line of people waiting to perform was really long, so obviously a lot of people enjoyed it. T - The sandbox was pure fun - I chased people down in the sandbox by projecting my hand into the light, and then stood in the sand and saw kids playing with a projection puppy onto the sand. I was able to buy drinks from many of the stands set up near the pier and then at the north and south side of the installation. I didn't opt of food because I ate before attending. Santa Monica was transformed for one night and I enjoyed every second of it! Please do it again. read more

The "L" in GLOW, at least for 2013, should stand for "lame." For an event that's supposed to be about glowing and art, there was very little glow and not much art. With so many installations involving the complicated download of an app or limited showings, we missed out on several. No puppet show. No lighted fields. Other installations let in so few people at a time that the lines were not worth the weight. You would think the artists would take crowd expectation into consideration when they're designing. Several thousand people, while you have a supposedly glowing wishing well that allows for maybe 8 or 10 at a time? Not a good idea. At one point, my friend joked that the best glowing installation on the beach was the Ferris wheel. We had no idea until later that this actually WAS considered an installation, with a special light design for the event. The best installation by far was the lighted netting on the beach. This was very cool, with nets reflecting various colors, to the rhythm of a soundtrack. The artist was on hand to answer questions. This is what I expected the entire event to be like. Unfortunately, it wasn't. Parking is bad if you want to park close, but if you didn't mind walking 10 blocks, parking was free. There was also a shuttle bus running from outer areas. This was a great idea, except it didn't seem to be running at 1am, even though the event went on until 3am. To make this event epic in the future, GLOW organizers need to bring in more high-quality installations that truly represent glowing art. A big thumbs down for 2013, with hopes that organizers make some key changes for the next time around. read more

I was really excited to go this year but I guess I had too high of expectations or any expectations at all. One exhibit asked you to download their app and people got frustrated because it wouldn't download. The people who did get the download just held their phone up and the screen was the color... Really? That's art??? We walked around to different exhibits (which weren't many) and nothing was happening. It was really weird and disappointing. Won't be going back next year! read more

I agree with many of these negative reviews. I wrote to the folks who put this on in 2008 and gave them suggestions on how to make this better but of course, no response. They don't seem to care what anyone thinks. Talk about arrogance. Does it make any sense to only have 15 installations when there are thousands of artists who want to display their work? They have it at the beach but most of the stuff has nothing to do with water. There were giant jellyfish in 2013. Folks, you might not be aware that we're killing our oceans with C02. What the air can't absorb, the ocean will. To a point that is. So much C02 is causing the ocean to become too acidic and is altering ocean life. My point is that why not use this art "show" as an educating tool to teach folks about the situation and what they can do about it? 150,000 can be taught that we can't keep destroying our oceans and get away with it without dire consequences. read more

Could have been great... but the shear numbers of people really made it hard to have a good time. Such a bummer they decided to close it down after Raul Campos' set (which was awesome, if only it hadn't been so hard to get and hang on the pier). I was looking forward to Jeremy Sol's set and seeing Viver Brazil at dawn - boy, I bet they were bummed. Sitting on the beach in chill drum circles is fun but I don't need to deal with 200K people to do that! I love being able to drink and smoke where I want but... it was so out of control that even I wish their had been more regulation! Given the money and effort that went in to it ($300K from the City and lots of smart, dedicated people putting in months and years of work) they sure did underestimate what is needed for such a big crowd/event... transportation/parking, TOILETS!, food vendors, spaced out/large scale activities, crowd control. If anything had have happened on the pier, it could have been a major disaster - the staircases were crazy! Will they do it again??? read more

I wholeheartedly agree with all the above comments. If I might add, no water was to be found anywhere unless you were willing to cue at an understaffed restaurant for 2 hours or buy it from vending machines that took only EXACT CHANGE!!!!!! This is a city prey of its own regulations and policing, very against street vendors on the beach. A guy with a hot dog stand on the beach would have made millions! I have voiced my concerns at the email address for glow at glow@smgov.net and you all should too! read more

Just because it was free does not give it permission to suck. Plenty of stuff is free and a hell of a lot better. Anyone who was impressed is very young, was very high/drunk or has never left their house. Ditto to what everyone else said, glad it wasn't just me. I parked 9 blocks away for free before the traffic crunch and walked. Smart, huh? Except I left the phone that I needed to communicate with the group in the car. Walked Colorado back instead of Olympic not knowing that 9th and 10th streets don't go all the way through, so walked 13 blocks back to car, 9 back to pier and finally 9 back to car. Got my exercise in. Now I think that if we had all stayed off the pier at least we would have missed the worst part. read more

A complete hassle. Some areas can get packed. People also really pushy and walk into you and they don't say anything. Bus drivers and workers claim they stop at the pier but they stop about 7 blocks away. Parking is limited and really expensive (probably how the city/event makes money). Couple things there were ok. To make the event better they should make the busses stop at the pier and make more parking and make $2 to $6 or free for disabled depending on where you park and have free wheelchairs and electric wheelchairs with handicap plaque or doctors note and recent picture and along the pier and walk areas around the pier. Also offer 20% to 40% discounts at all places in Downtown Santa Monica and SM Pier. If you buy 1 of 3 glow event papers (green, red, and blue) for $2 green and 20% off, $3 blue and 30% off, and $4 red and 40% off. read more

i had a lovely time myself. but then i sometimes create my own alternate universe in which all is right with the world. and as my friend and i trotted through the sand to get a closer look at the light "installations" , and have the pleasure of being at the beach far longer than we would normally dane... we celebrated surviving the parking conundrum, reveled and documented the the little pleasures, our anticipation at waiting in line for the authentic cotton candy spun on yes, a glow stick - perhaps the best cotton candy ever had! and lest we not forget the treasure hunt that was our search for the poetry boat...and yes a poem on the topic of sci fi was recited to me to my great satisfaction. glow worms unite...tomorrow is another day....and i will celebrate that one too... read more

Okay, I take it back...I will attend 2012. I did find something extremely positive about Glow Santa Monica; The weather on the beach was awesome! Thank you Mother Nature! Oh and the Santa Monica Police Department horses were really cute. read more

Yowza. After all the hype on KCRW, this was entirely disappointing. Aside from the nightmarish parking options (none, essentially), I was hoping to check out the Colorfields installation that was talked about on the radio almost every single day on my morning commute. It sounded SO COOL. I downloaded the app, and dragged my sleepy friend and boyfriend along on the trek from NoHo to SM. How sad I was that this event was so ill-planned. Seeing that many people on the beach at night was fun, but all was for naught when we went to the Colorfields piece and the app didn't work. No matter where we were on the beach, the app told us we weren't there yet! Of course, you can't really test this unless you have that many people on the beach, and night-of was the only time that was going to happen, but I was really let down. Not even the members of my group who were "under the influence," shall we say, were impressed by any of it. None of the other installations were worth sticking around for, so we took the ride home in silence. All in all, this festival could take about a million pointers from Burning Man, and I might consider going again. We'll see. read more

First review for 2010? This event shouldn't have repeated it if they couldn't get more art than this. Absolutely no reason to have the art so spread out and require such walking between venues. Paris it ain't. I won't say anything about the art itself because I'm a struggling artist myself... Having an iPhone/Android app was a good idea. Until you try to use it. No map integration. Just a bunch of text boxes you can scroll. Never again. I feel like a fool for going twice. That said, some dudes started showing up at midnight with their own boomboxes. I'm sure they had fun. They seemed like they would have fun wherever they went. read more

Completely over rated. I can't determine which installation was a bigger let down; The kite with LED lights attached -- the projected video of the beach during the day (which we saw live earlier that day) -- or the white light hung to a small crane. I think it was the last one. They put a white light mounted on a 20 foot crane. I think the "art" was illustrating that bored drunk people from LA will circle under a light aimlessly like firefly's for hours. The joke was on you if you stood under the light or if you went to this event. Another "installation" was a large BBQ that looked like a small train. It was called "BBQ Train"...and it was being used to BBQ food for people. That's not art; but it shows how desperate they were for art installations. I hope they have the sense to replace the director of this event, fund it better, or just end it. Great idea -- horrible execution. read more

Was really excited and came out with a bunch of friends and the event was horrible, poorly organized and executed and it appeared like there was no real review of the exhibits to try and hold up any kind of standard. A drum circle with lights? Come on, that's on this beach every weekend. So many lost opportunities I can't even begin. Where was the art???? Parking - Nightmare Guests - half rave half hippy hang out - zero anything that would excite true art patrons. Bottom Line - Worthless read more

You live in a metropolitan area that is home to about 13 or 14 million people. You tell those people that there will be an event that celebrates art, music, and community, free of charge. When massive numbers of people show up in hopes of coming together for one night, is that something to complain about? Don't sit here and tell me "it was too crowded". You live in one of the world's largest cities. We should at the very least be happy to see that there are so many people interested in hanging out with each other in a city that is notorious for being pretentiously divisive and spiteful. That was a beautiful thing, despite the failures of the event. Be happy and hopeful that we, as a city with all our diversity, at least have that basic desire to hang out together! Did Santa Monica drop the ball on this, their first event? Yes, but at least be constructive in your criticism. I'll be honest though. the one review about "stapling grunions" to your balls was fucking funny. Some points: - Keep the music going ALL night. Stopping it prematurely was just weird. - We live in a city with magnificent schools of art and architecture, as well a thriving community of artists outside of institutional education. More outreach should been done to get these talented people involved and to help organize! - For the massive number of people there, the Santa Monica PD handled the situation really well and were EXTREMELY tolerant and friendly from what I saw. I'm not used to police being this way, and it was actually pretty fucking cool to think that we can allow people to do their own thing (whatever that might be ;) ), so long as no one oversteps their bounds. - Use this event in the future to herald in some change in public transit! We need to be able to go out to our bars, get wasted, party together, and get home SAFELY without driving. The next event really needs buses that run all night. Pay the drivers overtime and thank them for helping to build confidence and bring business to the city. - The residents of Santa Monica who didn't go out to the event are fucking rad for being host and hostesses to this event. In MOST cities, there would be a bunch of "Get off my lawn!" type grumblers with blood pressure issues shooting this down at city hall. I could write more, but I'll spare you. While there were obviously a number of shortcomings I think with better planning and coordination would make for an epic, SORELY needed event in Los Angeles. Will I go to another one? Yeah for sure. Will I be stapling grunions to my balls next time around (or any other time)? Probably not. :D Take it easy. -A read more

It was terrible. Poorly organized event...and parking was a pain. People traveled far and expected to see something wonderful and innovative. There were tons of people on the pier just standing around and the exhibits were all over the place and far from one another. I would have been happier if they had organized walkways so people won't have to tread through the sand. Some of the numbers signifying the exhibits were peeling off and it was hard even locate the exhibit that you wanted to see. I am very disappointed. read more

I'd give a negative review too if possible. I had read about this on LAWeekly and was so interested in it. I truly approached it as a chance to experience something inspirational, artistic, etc... Instead, as many others have said, it was disorganized and totally disappointing. It's hard to appreciate exhibits when you can't figure out where they are or what they are. The crowd seemed completely confused and I got the feeling that most people just wanted to rave on the beach. Having read past reviews, it seems like every year this is the reaction of those who attend, yet there are no "official" bad reviews in all of the news outlets that hype the event up before it happens. Seems like a bad PR stunt that Santa Monica is using to benefit their "artsy" image in the world, but with no basis in the reality of what the event is. Instead of ending up inspired, I'm just angry for having wasted my time. read more

As an artist, a Santa Monica resident & having attended Burning Man, this year's GLOW event was unimpressive. They could have simply invited some of the artists from Burning Man to display their art installations (San Francisco does this) & it would have been much more memorable than last night's "art". Most of the displays seemed "half-baked" and uninteresting. Attended the first "Glow" and that was bad, had hoped this one would have shown progress, but nope. Everyone strolling around was remarking how much of a disappointment Glow was, tsk, tsk, Santa Monica you can do better! read more

parking is a ridiculous $15!!! each exhibit was so far away from each other!!! and it was so dark you couldn't see anything. it was even hard to read the map...I didn't get some of the art pieces and most of them had ridiculously long lines!!! definitely not as great as I expected.... read more

this had to be the most crappiest event ever. seriously this was embarassing for the city of santa monica. parking was horrendous. so much traffic just to find out the city owned paking was FULL. finally found parking and we walked towards the pier. honestly the glow exhibits were f*%@ing lame. there were 5 inch video screens inside the cannons. i honestly thought the cannons that were always in the park were going to project some cool images out towards the ocean. that thing in the water which was an inflatable covered with bubble wrap with christmas lights in it tethered to the pier was ridiculous. we honeslty expected some type of cool light show, very dissappointing. heard this event cost 300K to produce. what a waste. someones head at the city should roll for this crappy and embarassing event. read more

Glow Santa Monica was a bust. I invited a friend from out of the area after bragging about how great an event Glow would be. She was disappointed and I was even more disappointed. read more

I agree with all the other writers. Glow was a dud. Poor art. Poorly organized. I feel bad for the SM residents who paid for this. Gave it one star because you have to rate what you review. Glow deserves less. read more

How do you spell confused? I spell it G-L-O-W. Upon arriving at the Santa Monica pier my boyfriend and I were expecting a visual light show that would bombard our senses and leave us amazed. Um, not so much. The previous posts all speak for themselves and little else said is needed, but I wanted to add a few observations of my own. After checking out the randomly placed 'glow sticks in the sand' exhibit our hopes for an evening of alternative art began dissipating real fast. Besides the fact that anyone not riding the short yellow bus could have imagined up more creative exhibits we ventured further into Glow, descending into the lower circles of contemporary art hell. Moving on to the exhibits north of the pier we found nothing that could grab our attention for more than a few moments. Just enough time for us to ask, "What the hell was that?" Venturing onto the Pier proved to be a major mistake as well. Shuffling along with thousands of other people we soon discovered that nothing was happening other than city testing how many suckers they can cram onto the pier before it collapses. Sadly, that would have made the evening more eventful at least. The solar Koi parade amounted to nothing more than several people walking down the pier blowing whistles with stripped umbrellas attached to their backs and Koi fish wind socks with a little light inside them. Not sure why that was labeled as a parade, but my art appreciation skills may not be as honed as others. The coup de grace was the Aerial Shots of LA exhibit at Robinson's May. After convincing my boyfriend that it will be a cool visual experience to lay down on a padded floor and watch a continuous video of the city of LA that will inspire conversation among others we took our place in line and waited.. . and waited...and waited... over 45 minutes later we walk into a small room projecting a blurried and slightly disorientating view of LA at night. The only conversation this exhibit could induce is how stupid it was and we were for waiting in line to see it. Overall, the city of SM pulled a fast one on all of us. They convinced a myriad of people to descend upon the pier in droves, drawn by the lure of pretty lights and flashy objects, only to find ourselves in the middle of the most amateurish art exhibition this side of Ralph Wiggum's Star Wars 'diorama'. read more

GLOW was like KCRW's musical taste transposed into an art event. Constantly underwhelming and dull, but yet it somehow still exists. If you're one of the thousands of KCRW-subscribing women on the west side you might have been blown away by GLOW, but then you're also blown away by any given Bay Area artist who flips on drum machine and leans on a keyboard and calls it music. I wasn't expecting much and I have an assigned parking spot nearby for work so I checked it out. But I got out on the beach and was like "Is this it?" If you're gonna call it GLOW you better make it GLOW. The beach is a vast darkness so you better get your 20K arc lights out their and make it shine. I downloaded Jason Bentley's audio tour of GLOW when I got home and it instantly lulled me to sleep with its pretension. Next time I'm gonna sit in our office parking lot and charge suckers $40/spot and make a killing off of anyone who doesn't know enough to check YELP before going to GLOW. read more

My friends and I liked it a lot. I think people should give this event a chance without being overly critical about it. Sure I have seen "cooler" Art installations but I really love the idea and spirit of the event. I believe a lot of the people always think of Art like duh I can do that or oh okay now what? without really thinking deepe get inspired. I agree the event is far from perfect and there's always people try to make it into an outside club event or something but overall I can imagine how different and time consuming to pull off an event such as this. With some many different artist works and people so I really appreciate the experience. read more

Alright everything was pretty much said, but I wanted to add that the only thing memorable that stood out of LA and its insatiable crowds for Me, was this festivity, because for LA this thing was one of a kind. Yes it is one of the first and anyone should know the first time event can be a rough start, but 5* for effort this is what LA needs! Open air, some enthusiasm and you can't beat free! So for those who've never been to a rave, Or been to a rave and didn't do what you're, 'supposed to do' when you were there.. then to all those One Star ratings, you were out of your element. read more

I'm having the strangest dream. I'm trudging through thick sand towards something that resembles the Thunderdome. As we get closer, we realize it's a fish net with a light shining on it. Hundreds of people gather beneath it, waiting for something to happen. The light goes off, then on again. Someone remarks that the net is going to drop and capture us, thus completing the alien plan to harvest our flesh. After ten more minutes, the light turns red . . . then blue. Someone else says they paid twenty bucks to park for this. We turn and, slowly, trudge into the darkness, past a loud electric generator keeping a glowing beach ball alight, past a crowd making shadow puppets on a green board. Onward we trudge, towards our homes, wondering how a festival of lights could be so dark. I think I'm still trudging. read more

The quality of the "light" based art was poor. Anything resembling "experimental" use of light as art was missing. So so amateurish. There was no rhyme or reason...no over-riding theme. It was a bunch of lite exhibits strung far apart along the beach. A disappointing effort. read more

wish i'd read all the negative reviews here about past attempts at this utter mess. but i didn't because who would imagine that after prior messes, they would repeat the same mess (and besides KCRW says you'll like it, how could I be let down by KCRW?) ... remember the definition of insanity? this was it. overhyped waste of time. i scolded a friend who said she'd been to this before for not warning me against it. i would give this no stars if i could. i won't repeat all the other detailed one star reviews, ditto. i think what i was most dissapointed about was the overhype by KCRW. i'm a KCRW member, i love KCRW events and things to do. some hit an misses, but never total bombs. but this time KCRW bombed. i'm sorry KCRW, but from now on i will have to scrutinize your suggestions much more closely. and I hate to have to do that. what was advertised sounded like a wonderland of light sculptures, neon maybe, art displays that you could stroll by and enjoy ... not having to wait in line to go INTO something after wading from one end of santa monica beach to the other trying to figure out where things were. fury inducing. i will never go to this event again. read more

I loved the sihouettes of the office buildings, but think it would be cool to have a famous silhouette artist, like Cindi Harwood Rose be there and do real silhouettes of people freehand-- she may be too expensive, I saw her perform at a wedding, but she said she does it only for museums and to raise money for charity. read more

I just read some descriptions of the exhibits. They didn't sound anything like what I saw. For example, that one north of the pier with the ring of fire was supposed to be shipping containers submerged in sand. They were on top of the sand. ?!? So ppl were walking through metal containers on the beach. With some fire close by. Someone please explain the significance or even mildly interesting nature of this? I was perplexed the whole time. I went in 2010 and remembered of being kinda trippy and fun, with that karaoke moon face thing, the bubbles, and the light maze. This was tiresome, and a giant snoozefest. I mean in a mecca of creative, smart, fascinating ppl like LA/ Santa Monica, this was the best they could come up with? From what I read online, the artists are all accomplished and widely renowned. Why did I feel like I was at a jr high science fair where the kids didn't test out their projects adequately? I also mad I left a party I was enjoying early to waste hours trudging through the sand. And I love the beach, but I can do that any night without the crowds. Luckily I live within walking distance. I mean the parking and traffic is a joke. If I'd have paid $20 to park and waited in traffic for hours I'd be at city hall at 8am on Monday morn demanding my money back. read more

It stunk! I am soo glad that my friends and I didn't make Glow our plans for the night. I spent all day at an awesome pool party at the Custom Hotel. We were iffy on the whole Glow thing but we ended up heading out to Santa Monica around 2AM. We were lucky enough to find very close parking to the pier and it was free. We got to the pier and met with our friends. We also found out that they stopped the music. An all night event and at 2AM the music is over??? There were some idiots who were making a mosh pit to house music allegedly.... no cool art to look at and no music was a sign for us to go back to the hotel which is what we did.The only good thing about that mini trip was the car party we had in the parking lot, LOL. Blasted some music and hungout for bit. Glow was definitely over-hyped and a waste of time. I'm sorry for anyone who had to spend money on parking or a taxi for such an awful event.... read more