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Desert Futures: The Joshua Treenial’s 10th Anniversary & BoxoPROJECTS Vision
Desert Futures: Inside the Joshua Treenial’s 10th Anniversary and the Vision of BoxoPROJECTS
Dusk in Joshua Tree does a neat trick. As the granite turns lavender and the sky drops into deep cobalt, the boulders read like an open-air amphitheater. The audience has only grown. Joshua Tree National Park continues to explode in popularity, drawing global interest in its inspiring locale and people.
Visitor Impact: Joshua Tree National Park's 2023 visitation topped 3.27 million, generating $185.8 million in local spending and over 2,000 jobs. [nps] [patch]
That scale of attention has a cultural counterpart in the neighborhood: BoxoPROJECTS and its site-responsive festival, the Joshua Treenial, which celebrate a decade-plus of residencies, installations, and community programs this fall. The fifth edition—and 10th-anniversary celebration—of the Treenial runs November 8–16, 2025, under the theme Desert Futures, a week of art and dialogue about adaptation in arid lands, climate-responsive practice, and the ingenuity that deserts tend to coax out of people. The opening reception is November 8 at BoxoPROJECTS; the program culminates with sound performances at the Integratron on November 15, with viewing hours continuing through November 16.
BoxoPROJECTS and the Joshua Treenial are at the heart of Joshua Tree’s creative renaissance, fostering site-responsive art and community connection for over a decade.
We asked curator Bernard Leibov why artists keep returning, and he points to scale—of land and of spirit.
“The local landscape does inspire an expansive approach in visiting artists—not only does the work get physically larger, it also gets more experimental and larger in its set of references. This in turn seems to generate greater confidence and an amplified sense of purpose as visiting artists return to their home contexts.”
- Bernard Leibov
He credits the “vistas and night skies,” but just as much the community that meets artists where they are—through potlucks, studio visits, and long conversations that thread into future collaborations.
That value of place is built into BoxoPROJECTS’ residency program at BoxoHOUSE, which offers two- to four-week stays designed to remove artists from routine and embed them in the Mojave’s social and environmental fabric. Residents are encouraged to engage with neighbors and the land, and they’re expected to be self-sufficient—yes, you’ll need a car—while the organization facilitates connections and occasional meals. Fee scholarships are available based on need.
The result is work that tends to be site-responsive and community-forward, as much about process and exchange as polished objects.
Leibov’s path to the desert ran through New York. Before founding BoxoPROJECTS in 2009, he served as deputy director of the Judd Foundation and ran a non-traditional gallery, “box office,” that prioritized artists working outside the art-world centers—including early shows tied to Joshua Tree.
Andrea Zittel and her experimental art platform High Desert Test Sites drew him out here repeatedly starting in 2005; by his second or third HDTS visit in 2008, he recognized a strong sense of “home.”
“I had been working hard at ‘fitting in’ to New York City and the art establishment whereas my heart was drawn to doing my own thing.”
- Bernard Leibov
That pivot shows up in his curatorial approach—work that opens possibility, shifts perceptions, and situates aesthetics inside place, history, and community.
Artistic interventions in the desert landscape transform both artist and audience, inviting new perspectives on environment and process.
The first Joshua Treenial launched in 2015, co-founded by Leibov and curator KJ Baysa. It was expansive, a little unruly, and—in true high desert fashion—optimistic about what would happen if you put local and visiting artists in conversation across five venues and 60 projects.
Subsequent editions introduced a theme and focused on fewer, larger site-responsive works; the mix often split between regional and out-of-town artists to maintain cross-pollination. For this 10th-anniversary edition, the dial turns firmly toward home: all artists are local or deeply tied to the region.
The Treenial also activates a network of Cultural Partners—nine organizations programming along the Desert Futures theme—to ripple the experience across Joshua Tree, Yucca Valley, and Landers for the week.
That network approach dovetails with broader visitor trends: people aren’t just coming for a hike. An analysis of Airbnb stays in the town of Joshua Tree found an average 3.4-day visit— time enough to catch an opening, make a workshop, and get out under the stars a nightcap in Pioneertown.
Cultural programming meets these patterns, and local economies tend to notice.
Desert Futures leans into urgency with a maker’s mindset.
“I do think it’s now too late to keep ringing the alarm bells. The challenge for contemporary art now is to inspire people to make change in their daily lives and to demand change from larger players.”
- Bernard Leibov
He sees the strongest work either modeling solutions—material, social, architectural—or drawing people back into relationship with land and water.
That approach runs throughout the week: Yucca Valley Material Lab will teach mycomaterial sculpture with artist Sam Shoemaker and host Area Zero, a storytelling-and-community-building intensive—a hands-on look at biodegradable materials and social infrastructure.
Goat Gallery presents The Lazarus Effect, with repurposed photographic cutouts by Justin Moore and recycled pulp sculptures from Farout Collective—waste streams reimagined as narrative.
Harrison House pairs NASA Earth scientist Dr. Carmen Blackwood with permaculturist Dr. Gary Blackwood to connect satellite-scale perspectives with the logistics of backyard resilience.
High Desert Test Sites hosts Everything Changes, a participatory reading circle and guided meditation at A–Z West, threading climate art discourse back to body and site.
Participants engage deeply, whether sculpting with mushrooms, reimagining waste, or meditating on changes both global and personal.
Partners also stretch into movement and performance. Compound YV folds in a plein-air painting retreat, a movement-based performance by Stephanie Zaletel, and an exhibition titled Waiting for the Wind—staged in a storefront gallery that has become a lab for experimental programming since 2018.
Bezerk Productions’ Linda Sibio leads a two-day workshop, “Hieroglyphs and the Insanity Principle,” amplifying marginalized voices through symbolic storytelling at The Firehouse in North Joshua Tree.
And siblings Aaron and Case Sheppard will stage Holy Mountain, Starman!, a light-and-sound performance that taps into the desert’s very specific brand of mysticism.
Some settings are hard to fake. The Treenial traditionally ends in Landers beneath the white dome of the Integratron, where sound performances travel through the building’s acoustics with uncanny clarity. This year’s sound offerings land there on November 15.
Elsewhere, installations and projections have used Joshua Tree’s rock formations as canvases, the kind of gesture that only reads if the night sky participates—which it often does.
The geography is part of the script, but so is the social landscape: neighbors who offer power, shade, tools, and time—a repertoire that shapes the art as much as the limestone does.
Practical Tips for Visiting the Joshua Treenial and Joshua Tree Art Scene
Dates and anchor events - Joshua Treenial: Desert Futures runs November 8–16, 2025. Opening reception at BoxoPROJECTS on November 8; exhibitions and programs continue throughout the week; closing sound performances at the Integratron on November 15. Locations vary across Joshua Tree, Yucca Valley, and Landers; check the Treenial site for the site map and hours as they post updates closer to the dates.
Don’t-miss venues and partners
- BoxoPROJECTS/BoxoHOUSE (Joshua Tree): Residency base and opening-night hub; programming emphasizes site-responsive, community-engaged art. [boxoprojects]
- The Integratron (Landers): Historic dome and closing-night sound setting; plan ahead for capacity-limited performances. [gaydesertguide]
- Compound YV (Yucca Valley): Artist-run nonprofit with an eye for experimental shows; recent exhibition Recurrence ran through March 16 with Friday–Sunday gallery hours, 12–5 p.m.—a good indicator of typical rhythms and accessibility. [compound yv]
- Beatnik Lounge (Joshua Tree): A cultural hub known for themed exhibitions, youth shows, and readings; a reliable stop during art weekends. [beatnik lounge]
- Art Queen (Joshua Tree): A lively complex of studios and micro-galleries next to the World Famous Crochet Museum—wander-friendly and great for discovering new work. [art queen]
- 29 Palms Art Gallery (Twentynine Palms): The region’s oldest arts organization, housed in a historic adobe near the park, with monthly exhibitions and a well-curated gift shop. [29 palms art gallery]
Planning your time - Balance hiking with art. Consider morning trail time, a midday gallery circuit along Highway 62 between Joshua Tree and Yucca Valley, and an evening performance or projection. The Treenial program intentionally spans days and formats to fit how people move through the desert. [gaydesertguide] - Book lodging early. Fall is a sweet spot for weather and events, and the average stay clocks in at just over three nights—enough time to see work, meet artists, and get into the park without rushing. [airbtics] - Drive smart. Venues sprawl across the Morongo Basin, and most sites require a car; allow buffer time between programs. [boxoprojects]
Conclusion: The Enduring Power of Art in the High Desert
A decade after its scrappy first edition, the Joshua Treenial has settled on a clear north star: site-responsive projects that braid aesthetics with environment and community, produced by an organization that treats the desert as both studio and classroom. BoxoPROJECTS’ residencies have brought dozens of artists into that conversation, and the 10th-anniversary edition centers the region’s own voices in a week of activity that’s equal parts celebration and working session on what comes next. [boxoprojects][franklinfurnace][Bernard Leibov interview]
With the dates set, schedules evolving, and partners readying their programs, there’s time to plan a visit that puts you in the room—and out on the land—when Desert Futures becomes present tense. [boxoprojects][gaydesertguide]
