18 Hours in Joshua Tree
I went back to the desert for a short little stint in Joshua Tree. The impetus for my trip was seeing The Boxmasters. Okay, really I was there to see The Boxmasters lead singer, Billy Bob Thornton.
We set off after I got off work, Christian picked me up at a school in San Marcos. The nav said two short hours and we’d be in Joshua Tree, taking a two-lane back road past Pala casino to miss all that nasty traffic on the 15 through Temecula. Unfortunately for us, and the people involved, a fatal car accident occurred mere minutes before us on the road. We were stuck on that two-lane for over 90 minutes. We debated turning around and heading for the 15 but the nav showed the arteries as the deepest shade of red. Looks like we needed to just sit and wait.
I read my book and only had one minor tantrum. “What are the odds?” I shouted at no one in particular. The ride home from Palm Springs two weekends earlier had been thwarted by a similar accident through the mountains that resulted in a U-turn and an extra couple of hours getting back. However, the time spent was not without levity as the car in front of us had all he could stand and made his retreat mere seconds before the traffic began moving. Isn’t it a little too ironic, don’t you think?
Originally we planned to have some time to relax before heading to Pappy + Harriet’s in Pioneer town for the show but our late arrival meant we had just enough time to change clothes and head quickly over the pass to the venue. Billy Bob was already singing as we came in. We took our places in the crowd a listened to the music, inspired by 1960s bands with all original tunes. Billy Bob is charismatic, a great frontman. I loved the stories he told about each song even if most of the music wasn’t really my style. We left after the show to a lightning show behind the mountains across the desert. I tried to take in as much of the stars as I possibly could before the clouds rolled in.
The next day we explored a little of Joshua Tree and Yucca Valley. We got coffee at Joshua Tree Coffee Roasters with the rest of the hip crowd and went to Joshua Tree Country Kitchen for breakfast. We bopped around several of the shops and galleries in the area like The Station, Art Queen (Shari Elf’s gallery and store), and La Matadora Gallery. Stopping into the tiny Crochet Museum in its odd green house is always a must. It was Christian’s first time in Joshua Tree and it was fun to experience it through his eyes.
The sun was rising along with the temperatures as we drove out to one of my favorite places on Earth, the Noah Purifoy Desert Art Museum. Noah Purifoy is an artist from Watts who first rose to prominence with his 66 Signs of Neon, a 1965 found object art installation and exhibition focused on the artifacts of the Watts rebellion. In 1989 Purifoy moved his practice out to the desert and began working on his monumental assemblages there. This is my third time visiting the outdoor museum and it’s amazing to see what has and hasn’t changed over time.
The desert is such an arid climate that although the landscape is harsh, things are oddly preserved for long periods of time. The sculptures are just as I remembered them on my first visit over 10 years ago. One of the more significant works however, Earth Piece, which was one of Purifoy’s motivations for moving his practice into the desert, is drastically different. On my first visit to the museum, you could walk through the dug channel of the installation, below the surface of the sand. Now, the sides are caving in and the desert is reclaiming the space created by Purifoy. There is a balance in working with nature and nature becomes the co-creator (and co-destroyer) of art. Purifoy had to have intended his assemblages to change and decay over time. There is a decidedly somber feeling to the sculpture garden and it’s always quiet, even as other people meander around. The viewer feels the weight of the subject matter dealing with race, war, militarization, gender roles, inequality, and consumerism. It’s amusing and shocking to look at the decayed hulls of televisions and vacuum cleaners, at once state-of-the-art, now clunky and decaying junk. I am reminded of the fact that there is indeed so much produced by humans and that much of it endures for far longer than it is useful. My favorite piece is a round shack-like building full of computers and military memorabilia, it feels like the command center of an ancient-futuristic civilization.
After leaving Noah Purifoy’s art museum we headed toward Yucca Valley and explored a few of the vintage shops along the way. I was excited to see a small installation of work by Lorien Stern at one of the shops. I also spotted a Bunnie Reiss mural on our way out. There are so many interesting things in the desert and it only becomes more of a legitimate art destination as the years go on. I vow to return in cooler temps to hike through the park which is something I haven’t done in a long time. As we left the white clouds greeted us over the mountains and I was once again reminded of the need for open space that the desert provides. The dry air is a purification, the smell of the creosote a spiritual cleansing. The gnarled little Joshua Trees lent their alien bent to the landscape. I returned inspired and grateful.
