Except that the 364 concentric sand mound circles are stationed within the breathtaking rock formations of AlUla, the ancient region in Saudi Arabia that has drawn people and civilizations for over 200,000 years, they look like dozens of sandcastles, some bigger than the others, the remains of hours of imaginative play.
Jim Denevan, a US artist, created the sand mound circle. “Angle of Repose” is one of the first and largest works on display during the second edition of Desert X AlUla, which debuted on Feb. 11 and runs until March 30.
Local volunteers from AlUla assisted in the creation of the piece. The size of the sand dunes decreases as one approaches and enters the piece. The experience is beautiful and bizarre, leading one to wonder if they are actually on Earth or in some remote alternate dimension. Denevan’s goal was to shape the visitor’s experience in the desert, much like his countless sandcastles.
Denevan’s piece is one of 15 now on display at Desert X AlUla, a site-specific contemporary exhibition of colossal art in the desert that opened in early 2020 in AlUla. The festival, which began in 2017 in California’s Coachella Valley, is about making work in interaction with the land while also encouraging cross-cultural dialogue and the exploration of current issues.
This year’s event, which is free and accessible to the public, was organised by Reema Fadda, Raneem Farsi, and Neville Wakefield, the founding creative director of Desert X.The event was held in a larger venue, the Al-Mutadil valley, with the theme “Sarab,” which means “mirage” in Arabic. The artists, who came from all over the world, including the United States, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Ghana, created work that was rooted in notions of literature, nature, history, and culture that were essential to the desert environment in which they were put.Visitors can enter Deumer’s greenhouse from the desert, as if they were entering an underground bunker with a solar roof. Solar power simulates what you see outside by projecting a live stream from the outside onto plants contained in a glass vessel inside, creating artificial light that nurtures and grows the plants. Wakefield remarked, “She’s constructed a perfectly self-sustaining system.”
Shezad Dawood’s two coral-like sculptural forms, dubbed “Coral Alchemy” I and II, similarly contemplate the environment’s ancient and current uses, particularly AlUla’s relationship to water—hundreds of years ago, all of the rock formations visible today were submerged.
