Experience is the shortcut to success –

Attracting Contemporary Art and Cultural World’s Elite to Coachella Valley

Hotel to Offer Exclusive $10,000 Package w/ Heli Tour of Outdoor Site-Specific Works

Plus access to behind-the-scenes & Special VIP Events

Palm Springs, CA (July 2016) – Triada Palm Springs, a new Marriot International Autograph Collection® hotel, is pleased be the first hotel sponsor of Desert X 2017. This site-specific contemporary art exhibition, opening on Saturday, February 25, 2017 and running through Sunday, April 30, 2017 – will bring important international artists to the Coachella Valley to create art, engage viewers, and focus attention on the Valley’s natural wonders and vibrant atmosphere. Acclaimed, Los Angeles-based artist, Ed Ruscha, sits on the board of the nonprofit Desert X; Neville Wakefield is artistic director.

Triada Palm Springs will house Wakefield throughout the event’s inaugural year and will host special events duringDesert X, becoming a go-to location for benefactors and attendees of the exhibition.

The inaugural Desert X is free and open to the public and will engage the cultural and geographic specificity of the Coachella Valley from Palm Springs to the Salton Sea. It will include site-specific commissions by select international contemporary artists in a variety of non-traditional and institutional contexts. The desert landscape will become the canvas for a curated exhibition in various locations, offering visitors a way to see the Valley and reflect on serious and playful issues through the lens of the participating artists’ creativity and work.

To commemorate its participation, Triada has announced the creation of an exclusive $10,000 Desert X VIP Package that includes:

A Founding Membership to Desert X with VIP access to parties/events, etc. – A $3,000 per person value limited to a small group of dedicated art patrons. This portion is a tax-deductible contribution to Desert X.

A helicopter tour of Coachella Valley, where visitors will get a bird’s-eye view of some of the outdoor art installations.

• A private tour of key exhibits with a member of the Desert X team.

• Lunch with Desert X founder, Susan Davis, at a special valley venue.

• Three night accommodations in one of the hotel’s expansive casitas and daily breakfast.*

With art biennials in Istanbul, Sharjah, and Cartagena as reference points, Desert X is also a recurring exhibition. It is designed to inspire, energize, and reignite curiosity in the multilayered southern California desert, allowing the region itself to function as protagonist, while providing a new context and perspective through which international trends in contemporary art can be experienced.

As the guiding force behind the February to April event, the Desert X Board of Directors reads like a who’s who of the philanthropic and art worlds, with representatives from The Annenberg Retreat at Sunnylands, the School of Cinematic Arts at USC, Faena Art Center, Miami Beach & Buenos Aires, the Rudin Family Foundation and more. The exhibition will overlap with Modernism Week, Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival and The Stagecoach Festival, three of the area’s most well-known events.

Coincidentally, the recently opened Triada Palm Springs resort – formerly the Spanish Inn that welcomed stars like Elizabeth Taylor and Howard Hughes – has taken design inspiration from important pieces by Miro, Picasso and Dali, appealing to travelers who appreciate culture, authenticity and relaxed sophistication. Designed in a hacienda style with three wings and three color themes, Triada Palm Springs is a captivating, historically-rich boutique hotel offering guests a refreshing take on desert luxury.

“Participating in this ground-breaking event made complete sense for us,” explains Triada Palm Springs General Manger Todd Husted. “Not only does it celebrate the resort’s desert location and design inspiration, but it is also an opportunity to expand our guest base to a distinct group of individuals who value contemporary art and visual culture- international art lovers, collectors, and patrons – and beyond.”

“The desert of Desert X is the blank canvas upon which contemporary artists – like the writers, architects, musicians and other before them – will be invited to project their vision,” explains Artistic Director, Neville Wakefield. “Unique in that it takes the landscape itself as exhibition space, Desert X will offer the opportunity to explore both the familiar and the unknown through the eyes of others.” Referencing Honoré de Balzac’s words, Wakefield adds, “If the desert is indeed God without man”, then Desert X is art without constraint.”

ABOUT TRIADA PALM SPRINGS: Triada Palm Springs is the first Marriott Autograph Collection Hotel – a group of unique, independent hotels by Marriott offering points and benefits to Marriott Reward Members – in the Coachella Valley and only the third in California, with the others in Lake Arrowhead and Imperial Beach. Located in the chic Movie Colony district of downtown Palm Springs and nestled in the San Jacinto Mountains, the property first opened over 8 decades ago as a private residence and has recently been redesigned transforming into a 56-room modern Mediterranean retreat that continues to be a top desert valley destination for the Hollywood elite.

ABOUT DESERT X: Founded in 2015 as a not-for-profit charitable organization to develop, organize and produce a major, international, contemporary art exhibit featuring site-specific installations in selected venues throughout the Coachella Valley and surrounding area. The themes and location of the exhibition will engage surrounding communities, other Valley organizations, visitors, and students through works that respond to environmental, social and cultural conditions specific to the Valley, while also focusing attention on the creative energy of the participating artists and their work.www.desertx.org.

* In addition to exclusive members’ events, the Founding Membership will jointly select one artist’s piece, which will be identified as underwritten by the Founding Membership Fund. Founding Members will be updated on the progress of the selected piece, as it is created, in real time, and will have an occasion to meet the artist.

**Casitas include an open kitchen, dining room, outdoor seating areas and bath and half.