Joshua Tree National Park, Shake Natural Pejoration

I built the roadside marker on Hwy. 62 pointing toward the Park’s west entrance in 2006, at what now seems a much quieter time, when the Park saw a fraction of today’s traffic. Once the site was secured and project approved by the Joshua Tree Chamber of Commerce, my goal was to build a sculpture that would provide a simple function for the town as well as offer more whimsical and sometimes cryptic permutations of its being. The Joshua tree form itself is built from cedar that once belonged to John Muir, and was gifted to Henry Huntington at his home in Pasadena. The bottles decorating the tree were consumed and collected from the neighboring saloon during the sculpture’s installation.

During HDTS5 the letters of ‘Joshua Tree National Park’ were rearranged to display alternate messages, and over the next few years I continued to create anagrams to reveal the hidden potential in those words.

A few iterations included:
Jah So True, Ain’t No LA Kreap
Jesu Or Hate Kan Plan A Riot
Aloha Pioneers at Junk Art
and
Speak Into A Earth Journal

Since the sculpture was located at the main intersection in town it took on the patina of use by those living there as a local sign post for yard sales and fliers. It also became a landmark selfie stop, before the era of social media. The harsh sun and wind took its toll, and after time bottles and letters went missing, perhaps as souvenirs. After six years and several repairs I took the sculpture down to preserve it from further vandalism.

—Landon Wiggs (written 2020)