"It took us an hour to find parking in Westwood," said one artist Friday night at the invitation-only "Made in L.A." opening at the Hammer Museum. "The trick is to valet at the restaurant across the street," said another -- one of the 60 "emerging or under-recognized" artists in the show.

Yes, a full parking lot at the Hammer Museum was one sign of how much local support its biennial, organized with LAX Art, is receiving out of the gate. The opening night drew the usual mix of gallery owners, art collectors and consultants, plus throngs of artists and a good showing by curators and leaders from other museums: Rita Gonzalez and Stephanie Barron from LACMA, Jeffrey Deitch from MOCA and Deborah Marrow and Andrew Perchuk of the Getty among them.

The Hammer reports that total attendance that night was around 2,750, more than its Pacific Standard Time "Now Dig This!" opening and quite possibly the largest opening ever at the institution. The public opening on Sunday at Barnsdall, another show venue, drew 3,500.

The only group conspicuously missing at a biennial designed to introduce L.A. artists to a broader audience: curators, critics, collectors and the like from New York and abroad.

In its big contemporary art issue a few weeks ago, New York magazine included the opening of "Made in L.A." (sandwiched chronologically between the debut of the Manifesta biennial in Genk, Belgium, and the start of Documenta in Kassel, Germany) in its "don't-miss-out itinerary of the art-world traveler."

As it turned out, most of these ideal or idealized (a.k.a. tireless) art nomads did miss out on the L.A. event, though of course they could catch the show later in the run. Is it too harsh to say that the future of "Made in L.A." depends on it?