Desert X installations being put up, exhibit starts next week

The 2021 Desert X outdoor art exhibition will get underway next week in the Coachella Valley following a brief delay due to the coronavirus pandemic. A dozen artists from eight countries including Egypt, Argentina and Saudi Arabia will deploy their site-specific artwork at outside areas across 40 miles of the Colorado Desert. The art biennial will run from next Friday until May 16. Organizers have billed the 2021 Desert X exhibition as among the first regional art events since the pandemic began this time last year. This year’s version — the third since kicking off in 2017 — has nudged various social and environmental justice themes into the forefront. "The projects explore many of the issues we face in these difficult times: the history of land rights, ownership and stewardship, the desert as border marked by narratives of migration, social justice and racial demarcations of the West, the gendered landscape and the role of women and children, and the creation of new dialogues between regional and global desert experience," according to organizers. On its website, Desert X pays homage to the local Cahuilla people — "the original stewards of the land on which Desert X takes place" — who have called the Coachella Valley home for some 5,000 years, according to the Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians. "We pay our respect to the Cahuilla People, past, present and emerging, who have been here since time immemorial," the website reads. Desert X was originally slated for Feb. 6 to April 11, but organizers postponed the event due to Gov. Gavin Newsom’s regional stay-at-home orders, which were lifted late last month. The event will go on without a live "smoke sculpture" aimed at celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Living Desert Zoo and Gardens in Palm Desert. Judy Chicago’s "Living Smoke: A Tribute to the Living Desert" planned to shoot non-toxic colored smoke into the air on April 9 to highlight the natural beauty of the 1,200-acre zoo property. Chicago, a self-described feminist artist, crafts "smoke pieces aimed at momentarily transforming and feminizing the landscape without leaving a mark or trace," according to Desert X. The zoo nixed the installation due to environmental concerns. This year’s event will also offer a beefed-up digital presence for remote viewing opportunities. Artistic Director Neville Wakefield returned to the helm of Desert X for the 2021 installation, along with a new co-curator, Cesar Garcia-Alvarez, executive and artistic director of The Mistake Room, a nonprofit art space in Los Angeles. Garcia has curated a wide range of notable exhibitions and projects in the United States and abroad and was the U.S. commissioner of the 13th International Cairo Biennial in Egypt from 2012-2013. Garcia-Alvarez previously pledged to work closely with local artists and residents in his work at Desert X. More information is available at http://www.desertx.org.