After a residency at the Mojave National Preserve, Dani Dodge will have a solo show at the Joshua Tree Black Rocks Gallery.

Where: Black Rock Art Gallery in the Black Rock Nature Center located at 9800 Black Rock Canyon Rd, Yucca Valley, CA 92284

Hours: 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. Friday, Saturday, and Sunday

Phone: (760) 367-3001

The show runs through April 29, 2022.

Story:

My residency at the Mojave National Preserve began in 2018, and I made regular visits through 2021. Over those years, I developed a relationship with the Preserve's Joshua trees. I felt the joy of their abundance in the first two years, the devastation of their burning in 2020, and then a glimmer of hope at their potential recovery in late 2021.

To me, they are souls. They are gods. They are nature incarnate, and I grasp onto their struggle to survive deeply within my soul as though it were my own.

“Embracing the Incarnate” follows and documents my four-year journey of love with the Joshua trees and the Preserve.

My work in the show depicts the complexity of the time by displaying altered images from 2018 through 2021 that demonstrate the majesty and the fragility of the Joshua trees and their environment. Each of the images has been printed on layers of clear plastic, painted with 24-karat gold leaf, fused, mounted on black, and framed. The result is a feeling of slippage that fluctuates between shadow and shimmering light.