CM
interview+photos JORGE PEREZCHICA
Sunnylands’ observation of Coachella Valley Days of Los Muertos took place October 28 through November 1st. Despite COVID-19 concerns, the show safely goes on to celebrate this annual family tradition. With face masks required and health protocols in place, guests were invited to walk the gardens decorated with giant calaveras (skulls), papel picado (decorative cut paper), nichos (shadow boxes) created by local artists, and ofrendas (altars) designed by local nonprofit organizations.
Sunnylands, the former Annenberg Estate, located in Rancho Mirage, California, is a 200-acre estate currently run by The Annenberg Foundation Trust at Sunnylands, a nonprofit organization. Nine acres of desert gardens surround Sunnylands Center. Designed by landscape architect James Burnett, the gardens include more than 53,000 individual plants.
Days of Los Muertos participants include: Palm Springs Art Musuem, The S.C.R.A.P. Gallery, Animal Samaritans, Palm Springs Cemetery, and Raices Cultura. The hand-painted nichos and giant calaveras were created in partnership with Raices Cultura. Since its inception in 2004, Raices Cultura has always operated as a small group of individuals interested in community engagement and the creation of beneficial social change. Coachella Magazine reached out to Marnie Navarro, the first-ever Executive Director of Raices Cultura to discuss her vision of Days of Los Muertos, collaborating with Sunnylands, navigating through the pandemic and more.
Hi Marnie. Can you tell us about your background as an artist and creative approach?
I’m a multidisciplinary artist informed by interdisciplinary practices and a lifelong valley resident. My creative output encompasses studio-based practices, curatorial practice, education-based art programs, and public art and community engagement. Everything in the world around me can be input or source material which is then filtered through my internal processes, whether it’s aesthetic, philosophical, logical, emotive, intuitive or some hybridity of all those things. My work manifests in many forms, often unrelated in materiality, but there is a thread running throughout that usually has to do with human behavior, interconnectedness, and exploration of the psyche.
What is your role at Raices Cultura and how did your involvement begin?
I am the first-ever Executive Director for this volunteer-driven grassroots organization with a 15 year history. In 2008, I participated as a volunteer artist for Dia de Los Muertos and continued to do so for various years. In 2017, I was invited to lead Raices’ youth art installation project for the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival and continue to fulfill that role. In 2019, I was hired as Executive Director to run the nonprofit organization.
2020 represented a rough year filled with elections, pandemic and protests. What challenges did you face organizing Days of Los Muertos at Sunnylands?
Everything about it was a challenge in a sense, but that’s true for anything worth doing. Despite these challenges, everything worked out perfectly in the bigger picture. Our annual block party in the City of Coachella with our multi-year event partner Run with Los Muertos was obviously not possible due to the pandemic. Even so, I felt it was incredibly important to create a commemorative moment for everyone in the community to still share some form of remembrance and to unify through our collective struggle and loss. I had this crazy idea about creating a special exhibition Somos Sagrados (We Are Sacred) for Dia de Los Muertos with large-scale nichos and imagined the artists I would like to see in the show. Sunnylands has always been an incredibly supportive partner institution and in discussion about collaborative efforts for this important traditional of Dia de Los Muertos, I put the exhibition idea on the table and it was met with instant enthusiasm. The whole thing was pulled together in about 3 weeks — it was wild and took constant work from everyone involved, especially the fabricator of the nichos, the visual artists, and Sunnylands and Raices staff. The response was incredible and it was so worth it – it always is.
Can you walk us through the creative process.
My process was to envision the artists collectively, knowing the forms of work they made, and leave their nichos completely open to their own ideas and creative decisions — that creative freedom is paramount.
All communications happened via email initially and then a couple of phone calls. I mean there is a lot in between there — sourcing materials, build plans, fabrication, delivery of the nichos, artists working in their studios day and night, and final assembly & delivery of the objects. The artworks were installed in the early morning hours on the opening day. Michaeleen Gallagher, Director of Education and Community Programs at Sunnylands, was instrumental in this entire process from supporting the idea at the start to finalizing the exhibition. Together, we walked and talked about the site and matched each artist’s sacred object to the precious site that is Sunnylands, maximizing the visibility of the art and exponentiate the viewer experience through curation of the objects.
How many artists/installations were created for 2020?
There were a total of 8 artists who made nichos for the Somos Sagrados exhibition at Sunnylands – Aaron Hansen, Yehsiming Jue, Kylie Knight, Consuelo Marquez, Monica Morones, Carlos Ramirez, Gustavo Rimada, and Tone Rubio. The artworks are available as a joint fundraising effort for the artists and our nonprofit; interested parties can make contact via email at ddlm@raicesdelvalle.org
One of the unique things I enjoy about Sunnylands is walking through the beautiful gardens. The installations complimented the environment but also made a strong social statement. What’s it like collaborating with Sunnylands and local artists of Coachella Valley?
It was a dream working with Sunnylands — I would love to do more things like this! The artists are amazing. It was a huge honor to have each artist in the show and I felt very blessed by their commitment and willingness to really push and make this idea become a reality. It felt like an important first step to see artists from the desert represented at this particular site — a place with such a powerful history of peacemaking and commitment to culture, especially at a time like this with a fraught social climate and devastating pandemic impact. It was a unique respite from the current day-to-day, which is basically a life devoid of social interaction and arts and culture experiences due to the necessary shutdown. I really hope people enjoyed it; certainly for me and the artists, it was a signifier of an important shift and created a lot of joy and excitement.
In the age of covid-19, what was the reception like compared to previous editions?
In Coachella, Raices invited members of the public and local organizations to place a limited number of outdoor physically-distanced ofrendas on November 1 at the new library green space. Raices staged a community ofrenda in front of our office across the street that stayed up until November 3 and we invited folks to email images of their loved ones to commemorate, which were placed on the ofrenda. We worked on a special project virtually through Zoom with the Sexuality and Gender Acceptance youth group (SAGA – Coachella Valley High School) to create an ofrenda in remembrance of the trans women of color who have been murdered. A steady stream of people stopped by throughout the day and evening — everyone wore masks and respected physical space and distanced appropriately. At Sunnylands, while I was there, folks were wearing masks for sure.
One alter that stood out to me as emblematic of 2020 was #SayHerName, Black Trans Femme Women. Tell us more about this piece.
Every year Sunnylands invites local organizations to create ofrendas (altares) and Raices participates each year. 2019 was the first year that I was involved in this process and I decided to create an ofrenda honoring notable Peacemakers Maya Angelou, Elijah Cummings, and Martin Luther King, Jr. For 2020, my colleague Mariela Gonzalez and I were in the brainstorming process for our Sunnylands ofrenda. Considering the different themes, Mariela suggested SayHerName and the minute she said it, I was like “that’s it, it HAS to be that, let’s do it.” We reviewed the tragically long list of women’s names whose lives have been taken due to police brutality — it moved me to tears and most importantly, action. Of those names, we selected Sandra Bland, whose death sparked the movement itself, as well as Natasha McKenna and Breonna Taylor. Mariela produced the biographical information for each woman and together we created the ofrenda at Sunnylands. We wanted to make a traditional ofrenda and center the focus on the stories and what happened to these women. It’s difficult to talk about, but we MUST discuss these critical and alarming issues; so many people really aren’t aware and have little understanding of the impetus for the movement. When I was there one day, from a distance I observed various people stop at the ofrenda and read each story; they took their time reading every line and then had some physical reaction to it, whether they touched their chest, recoiled in disbelief, or held on tighter to a loved one next to them — person after person, I watched some form of this happen. I’m incredibly thankful that Sunnylands created space to do that, to create impact and awareness.