Palm Springs
Seen Desert X yet? If not, what are you waiting for? You have till April 30, 2017 to see what all the fuss is about. The Instagram-worthy (check out #desertx and #desertx2017) site-specific exhibit has already attracted tens of thousands of visitors this spring—alleviate your FOMO go check it out!
An exciting new art project of the Desert Biennial, a nonprofit steering committee and charitable organization that promotes art and the environment in the Coachella Valley, Desert X, which opened Feb. 25, 2017, features indoor and outdoor installations across the valley and its striking desert landscape with 18 works by established and emerging artists. Projects “will amplify and articulate global and local issues that may range from climate change to starry skies from tribal culture and immigration to tourism, gaming and golf,” says the project’s website.
Steven Nash, former executive director of the Palm Spring Art Museum, and Beth Rudin DeWoody, art collector and president of the Rudin Family Foundations, are two of the visionaries behind the project. Neville Wakefield serves as the artistic director.
When asked about the show, Wakefield commented: “Artists from different parts of the world will be invited to make work that responds to the unique conditions of Palm Springs and the surrounding Coachella Valley. The desert of Desert X is the blank canvas upon which contemporary artists—like the writers, architects, musicians and others before them—will be invited to project their vision and to create from the extraordinary natural and social history around them objects and experiences that reflect upon the matchless spectacle of the geologic epic, the radical abstraction of the surroundings and the singular incursions of man into the seemingly barren landscape. Unique in that it takes the landscape itself as its exhibition space, Desert X will offer the opportunity to explore both the familiar and the unknown through the eyes of others. If the desert is indeed God without man, then Desert X is art without constraint.”
Desert X will stretch across locations within the 45 miles between the San Bernardino Mountains and the Salton Sea—a shallow, saline rift lake located directly on the San Andreas Fault, predominantly in California’s Imperial and Coachella Valleys. The exhibit is free. For more information, please visit: https://www.desertx.org/news/
Can’t make this year? There’s a good chance Desert X 2.0 will be back in 2019. The Desert Sun has reported that Susan Davis, founder and board president of Desert X, announced at a party for founding members Saturday that the board would begin fundraising for another Desert X event, slated to begin in February 2019.
About Desert X: Desert X is produced by Desert Biennial, a not-for-profit 501©(3) charitable organization founded in 2015 to bring the finest international artists to the Coachella Valley to create art, engage viewers, and focus attention on the valley’s environment—its natural wonders as well as socio-political-economic issues that make it vibrant, curious, and exciting.
