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Transcript/ScriptCONNECT Art in Desert
HEADLINE: Boundary-Pushing Art Installations in the Desert
TEASER: Creating art within the desert landscape of the Coachella Valley
PUBLISHED AT: 12/11/2023
BYLINE: Genia Dulot
DATELINE: Palm Springs, California
VIDEOGRAPHER: Genia Dulot
PRODUCER: Genia Dulot, Zdenko Novacki
COURTESIES:
SCRIPT EDITORS: AK, MJ
VIDEO SOURCE (S): VOA
PLATFORMS (mark with X): WEB __ TV _X_ RADIO __
TRT: 2:38
VID APPROVED BY: AK, MJ
TYPE: VPKGF
EDITOR NOTES: ))
((Eds: This is a self-narrated feature.))
((INTRO))
[[In the expansive and raw beauty of California’s Coachella Valley, a unique project named Desert X nudges artists to break boundaries, creating art that represents ecological, political, and historical narratives. VOA's Genia Dulot offers additional insights.]]
((NATS))
((Neville Wakefield, Artistic Director, Desert X))
Desert X is a project that’s really about creating art in the desert. We invite artists here. They look at the landscape, and the landscape in the larger sense. Not just what you see but the ecological, the political, the historical landscape. And out of that, they create works that have really been born of the desert.
((NATS))
((Matt Johnson, Artist, Desert X))
So, the piece sort of started with experimenting with blocks and units to construct figurative sculptures. Well, the containers are sourced from around the world. It’s more about our global dependence or our…the movement of goods and services, perching it between the railroad tracks and the freeway, which are the main arteries and the movements of really the lifeblood of consumption. And the human body is also an analogous to a vessel of consumption. And the sleeping figure directly references figurative sculpture across art history, reclining figures, but also more directly, the sleeping Buddha sculptures from Southeast Asia that are like sometimes 350 feet [107 meters] long. Certainly the idea of a sleeping giant as something that wake up and wreak havoc, you know, whether that’s our inability to deal with climate change or whether it’s climate change actually becoming something that is intolerable.
((NATS))
((Rana Begum, Artist, Desert X))
Number 1225 Chainlink is a work that is very much inspired by the time I spent in Palm Springs. I was seeing a lot of fencing and barriers. I saw it kind of throughout the day where it was changing in the light, and sometime it would be quite prominent, sometime it would disappear, sometime it would be really kind of ephemeral and quite beautiful.
((Neville Wakefield, Artistic Director, Desert X)) I think more and more people are looking to experience art outside of the bounds of the walls like this, like museums. I think that’s partly to do with this idea that it’s experiences that are really the most valuable thing and experiences are intangible. Having a moment in front of a piece in the middle of nowhere Is something that only you can have. And it’s different for everyone.
((NATS))
NewsML Media TopicsArts, Culture, Entertainment and Media
NetworkVOA
Location (dateline)
Palm Springs, California
Embargo DateDecember 11, 2023 16:54 EST
Byline
Genia Dulot, VOA News
Brand / Language ServiceVoice of America - English
