This live conversation features artists Gerald Clarke and Cannupa Hanska Luger and Desert X Co-curator Kaitlin Garcia-Maestas and took place March 29, 2025 at the Thompson Hotel in Palm Springs, CA as a part of the Desert X 2025 program.

This lively discussion between these two Indigenous artists unfolds reflections around land ownership, maintenance of culture and respect for place. Both Gerald and Cannupa have exhibited for Desert X, yet each chose different paths towards sharing their Indigenous views through their projects. Desert X Co-Curator Kaitlin Garcia-Maestas thoughtfully guides the conversation into deep considerations around what it means to create public art in an accessible way, where the audience is left to interpret the artist's ideas on their own terms and in their own time. As Desert X Artistic Director Neville Wakefield notes in the introduction to this conversation, “ Desert X operates on the legacy of Land Art, and one of the questions that legacy leaves unanswered is—‘whose land is it and what are our responsibilities to it?’.

Gerald Clarke is a visual artist, educator, tribal leader, and cultural practitioner whose family has lived in the Anza Valley for time immemorial. Gerald was a featured artist in Desert X 2023 and presented “Immersion”, a monumental artwork based on Cahuilla basket weaving knowledge while also embedding a game-like quality to the  installation in order to educate our current generations on Indigenous knowledge and language of the region. 

Cannupa Hanska Luger is a multi-disciplinary artist and recurring host for Broken Boxes Podcast. Cannupa is featured in Desert X 2025, presenting a multi-pronged project titled G.H.O.S.T. Ride (Generative Habitation Operating System Technology), an evolving speculative fiction project which includes a mobile art installation, a poetic billboard triptic, and a new short film building upon ideas from his Future Ancestral Technologies series.

Kaitlin Garcia-Maestas is Co-curator of Desert X 2025, on view March 8–May 11, 2025 at sites across the Coachella Valley, California. Garcia-Maestas is a part of the curatorial team under the leadership of Artistic Director Neville Wakefield and Executive Director Jenny Gil.