Jose Dávila’s The Act of Being Together is part of Desert X 2025. (Image: Kathryn Reed)

Random art in seemingly even more random places.

Except that it’s not.

Now in its fifth year, Desert X is definitely deliberate and well planned, with locations strategically selected throughout the Coachella Valley of Southern California.

What started in 2017 has become a biennial event that has grown to be a must-see attraction. Artists from around the world install artwork throughout the valley, with the two-month exhibit ending May1.

A pyramid of wildflowers and cacti by Agnes Denes is always changing. (Image: Kathryn Reed)

“The exhibition reflects on the desert’s deep time evolutions reframing ideas and wilderness and exploring themes of Indigenous futurism, design activism, colonial power asymmetries, the impress of humanity on the land and the role of emerging technologies in our contemporary society,” Desert X’s website says.

My friend, Kim, took me to a few sites last month, which enticed me to seek out other installations on my own the following day.

The imagination and creativity of the artists are off the charts. These are not works that could be found in any museum. Too big, for one.

Kim at Truth Arrives in Slanted Beams by Sarah Meyohas. (Image: Kathryn Reed)

The temporary nature of them is one of the attractions. With Desert X being a driving tour of art, this makes for another fascinating concept. I definitely can see how not going on a weekend and making it a multi-day experience would be the most rewarding.

As with so many works of art, who you experience them with matters. I enjoyed the day with Kim so much more so than my solo excursion. We chatted about what we liked, what the piece said to us. I also took more time with a friend than I did by myself.

The experience changes with the strangers who are there as well.

Ronald Rael’s Abode Oasis in Palm Springs. (Image: Kathryn Reed)

Kim was so moved by Jose Dávila’s The Act of Being Together it made me want to see it. I quickly understand why she was dismayed to have witnessed people climbing on the rocks. I also understood why she wanted to go back when others would not be there.

On first sight of these marble blocks stacked on one another I was transported back to Stonehenge.

Davila’s work is tied to the border, to immigration, to movement, to the world we live in today. The rock is from a quarry a few hundred miles away in Mexico.

“By taking the material from one place and adding it in another, he establishes a relationship between the void of its origin and the striking presence it creates in a foreign landscape. This notion of site and nonsite also plays with the idea of visibility itself,” the Desert X website says. “To reach their new home in the Coachella Valley, the stone blocks had to cross the border. In this migration, they also traversed a metaphorical border between the seen and the unseen. Appearing as if from nowhere, Dávila’s casually stacked marble blocks appear splintered across both time as well as space. Moved by the invisible forces of unknown histories, they evoke the archeological relics of ancient civilizations and the potential future of life beyond our own.”

Cannupa Hanska Luger’s G.H.O.S.T. Ride is not always in the same location. (Image: Kathryn Reed)

Ronald Rael’s Abode Oasis is an installation that is taller than me that was created with a 3-D printer and robotic programming. To have seen that in person would have been incredible. Just knowing this was part of the process was intriguing and extremely hard to imagine.

“Adobe Oasis invites visitors into a dynamic landscape, where passageways frame views of the land and sky, fostering solitude and connection—reflecting the cyclical flow of geologic time,” Desert X’s website says. “For Rael, this land-based project serves as both an artistic endeavor and a research initiative, with each of his 3D-printed adobe structures building on the last, advancing his vision for sustainable housing alternatives.”

Truth Arrives in Slanted Beams by Sarah Meyohas was a bit interactive, with mirrors with words on them catching the sunlight and reflected back on the wall. The curved walls and meandering path are extremely integral to the overall experience.

That’s the thing about each of these works—all had multiple components, all seeming to have a message much greater than creating beauty. They provoked conversation—which is why the experience was more powerful with my friend.