Getty Museum apologizes after explosive kickoff to new exhibit at Coliseum frightens community

The Getty Museum is apologizing after their highly-anticipated kickoff for a new arts event was a little too explosive to the liking of the community on Sunday. 

The series of blasts rattled the surrounding area, including the USC campus, and shook the people in attendance a little harder than they even thought was possible. 

Videos from both inside and outside of the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum show billowing plumes of smoke after the fireworks went off Sunday afternoon, but moments before the sky was filled with a vivid display of color — all part of the PST Art: Art & Science Collide exhibit which officially got underway with the ceremony. 

Despite the brief vibrance, the force of the explosions was so jarring that some people inside of the arena dropped their phones from recording the show to cover their ears instead. 

For those who weren't aware that the show was even happening, they say the suddenness is what had them most on edge, especially with such ominous clouds sitting over the stadium. 

"This looks like they blew up the Coliseum," said Khalil Mayden, a USC student who recorded the aftermath of the show. "I immediately checked with my friends and stuff."

Other students were concerned that they would have to drop everything since something bad might have happened on campus.

"I kept on hearing it over and over again, and I was like, 'Okay wait, do I need to go somewhere? Like, do I need to evacuate?,'" said Gaelle Jean-Pierre.

Even for those living off-campus, they say it sounded like a bomb went off. 

"This felt massive and it was so scary," said Astrid Kayembe, who lives near the USC campus. "I immediately looked outside of my window and just saw all of my neighbors from my complex, my neighbors' apartment complex, and even the one after that, we're all outside like, 'What is going on?'"

While The Getty billed the event as a celebration, officially kicking off their months-long exhibit that blends both art and science, most people say that the show was entirely too loud, leaving them shaken by the work of the renowned artist, Cai Guo-Qiang, whose signature is "daytime fireworks," made using biodegradable and organic pigments mixed with the medium — gunpowder. 

The noise, abruptness of the actual explosion, and the repetitiveness of the display made people believe that there were gunshots ringing out, especially in the finale, which some say was tone deaf. 

"The times that we live in, I mean, look at what just happened in Lebanon," said Carol Cheh, an art journalist. "Here we are setting off massive explosions with a ton of smoke and no explanation in a major city."

PST Art issued a media release prior to the event which was officially called "WE ARE: Explosion Event for PST ART."

"Beginning at dusk, WE ARE is a monumental, multi-act performance featuring the artist's signature daytime fireworks including ten thousand twinkling mini firework shells installed throughout the seating bowl of the Coliseum and over one thousand choreographed aerial drones carrying pyrotechnic products. The work will mark the first event of its kind in US history," said a media release from PST Art, noting that the show was created in collaboration with a custom artificial intelligence model. 

"The performance will recall the myth of Prometheus's theft of fire from the gods and suggesting a present-day parallel in the relationship between humanity and AI."

Shana Nys Dambrot, an art critic who was at the actual event, says that there is no doubt the show completed its goal to stimulate and provoke, but she's unsure if they went too far. 

"It felt like a barrage, and that would've been okay, but then it was pieces of the fireworks started raining down on the crowd and people are getting, like, hit in the head with little cardboard tubes and little bits of, like, nuclear winter fallout were all over everyone's hair and clothes," she said. "And that, I don't know, the combination of it all, I could feel my fight or flight viscerality kicking in."

After the public outcry, The Getty issued a statement, which read in part: "We are aware and very much regret that some neighbors and attendees were disturbed by the sound and smoke that marked this kick-off event. The Coliseum followed its normal process for events held at the stadium and notified municipal partners."