Lita Albuquerque transformed the Orange County community of Laguna Beach in November for the Laguna Art Museum’s (LAM) second annual Art + Nature. This multidisciplinary event/happening/festival showcased Albuquerque, who is known for her ethereal works of art, installations and performances that make reference to life, nature and our experience of time and space. Art + Nature incorporated multiple art spaces in the coastal city. 

An important figure in the Southern California art scene since the 1970s, Albuquerque gained national recognition with her transitory pigment installations in the California desert that touched on mapping, identity and the universe. In later works, Albuquerque continued to explore celestial spheres and constellations. In November, she revisited many of those same themes.

Albuquerque’s new work shown at the Peter Blake gallery is comprised of mainly smaller works, and this more intimate body of work is a nice juxtaposition to her massive installation at LAM. In the new work, Albuquerque explores the relationship between organic life and the cosmos. Many pieces feature oversized, resin-cast honey-colored bees interacting with an abstract atmosphere of bright blue pigment, simple geometric shapes and maps of the cosmos.

Lita Albuquerque, Particle Horizon, 2014, photo by Eric Stoner, courtesy of Laguna Art Museum.

“Particle Horizon” (2014), Albuquerque’s large-scale installation at LAM transports the viewer into another dimension. The Segerstrom Gallery on the lower level of the museum is covered from floor to ceiling in white salt, with moving stars projected all around the space. In the center of this environment lies one of Albuquerque’s signature pigment figures, bright blue and seemingly hovering, as if offered up to the cosmos. It rests on a coffin-like pedestal. Alluding to the impermanence of life and the neverending “now,” a soundtrack of different people’s personal reflections on experience plays loudly, drowning out speculation or self-reflection.

An Elongated Now (2014), Albuquerque’s performance at Main Beach, which took place at the opening of Art + Nature, has thematic ties with “Particle Horizon.” Both serve as poetic reminders that the human form is merely a vessel for life and expression. Elongated Now started at sunrise with only a handful of people. Over the course of the day, the number of participants grew to over 100, as the performance continued just past sunset. The participants, dressed all in white, reflected the blue glow of twilight. Their coordinated movement, simple and succinct, created an arc replicating the undulating waves of the ocean as they walked from the water’s edge to the museum and then, back again. This metaphoric oscillation between nature and culture thematically paralleled Albuquerque’s other works on display in Laguna. Though this site-specific piece was not as visually vibrant as some of her past site-specific projects, it provoked the right conversation, bringing the focus back to our relationship with our natural world.