Start an Art-Filled 2026 with the California Desert Plein Air Festival
By Chadd Scott on
No better way to begin an art-filled 2026 than with the California Desert Plein Air Festival January 8 through February 1 in Palm Desert. The event celebrates the California desert’s tradition of landscape painting en plein air – outdoors.
“Our landscape, flora, and fauna – we have the best,” Diane Moore, co-founder of the nonprofit Desert Plein Air Association, the Festival’s organizer, said of the area’s appeal to plein air painters. “And it happens that our prime time of year is January and February, and that’s not good for the rest of the country.”
The event opens with four days of paint-outs at scenic locations in Coachella Valley, Box Canyon, the Salton Sea, and the Mojave Desert. More than 80 artists will pick and study their vantage points and paint on site, then submit canvases for the exhibition and judging taking place at the Artists Center in Palm Desert. The public can further enjoy painting workshops January 8 and 9 as well as artist demonstrations held at Artists Center during the Festival every Friday and Saturday at 11:00am and 1:00pm, and Sundays at 1:00pm.
Another event highlight will be a plein air paint out at The Living Desert Zoo and Gardens January 27 when artists will apply their skills around the Zoo with the public welcome to watch on.
For the competition portion, artists will be vying for $15,000 in prizes; a category of studio desert landscape paintings has also been included, expanding the scope of artworks available to view and purchase.
A participant in the California Desert Plein Air Festival about to begin painting. Courtesy Desert Plein Air Festival.
Plein Air Painting in the Coachella Valley
Plein Air Painting in the Coachella Valley dates back to the coming of the railroad in the mid-1880s. The Southern Pacific Railroad allowed artists to ride in exchange for paintings, artworks the company subsequently used in advertising campaigns encouraging easterners to travel west. The exchange program enticed many of the top artists of the day to visit and paint the desert, some of whom continued on to Laguna Beach, Santa Barbara, and Carmel, bolstering ascending artist colonies there.
Diane Moore moved to the area in 2002 from the Bay Area after having been widowed and wanting to live closer to her sons. She hadn’t painted since 9th grade art class and figured if she enjoyed it then, she’d enjoy it in adulthood. She was right.
Moore later became involved in the local art scene, serving as a president of the Coachella Valley Watercolor Society and then the Desert Art Center in Palm Desert. Then COVID hit.
“It shut down all our education programs. It shut down our gallery,” Moore said. “I sat there with nothing to do and I told the board as much as I love Desert Art Center, my hands are tied now, there’s nothing I can do, and I really want to start a non-profit of plein air painters that encompassed all mediums.”
That became the Desert Plein Air Association. It was an immediate success.
“With COVID, nobody could go out and do anything, we couldn’t go out to dinner or anything, but we could go out and paint in nature because we could stay five feet apart, and it was such a hit,” Moore said. “It was the best time that I could have started Desert Plein Air. It started with tremendous success from the beginning and we’ve continued to grow.”
That growth soon included the first California Desert Plein Air Festival in 2022, emerging from a desire by membership to exhibit their paintings. Now, dozens of plein air painters from the Valley as well as those from across the Southwest participate.
Painting in plein air during the California Desert Plein Air Festival. Courtesy California Desert Plein Air Festival.
Coachella Valley Plein Air Painting Locations
For visitors interested in watching the artists at work, organizers are encouraging painters to turn up at the following locations. Painters typically arrive by 8:00 AM.
· Saturday, January 10th: Santa Rosa/San Jacinto Visitors Center (51500 CA-Hwy 74, Palm Desert)
· Sunday, January 11th: El Paseo Shopping and Business District (El Paseo between CA-74 and San Luis Rey, Palm Desert)
· Monday, January 12th: Ironwood Park (47800 Chia, Dr., Palm Desert)
· Tuesday, January 13th: The Living Desert Zoo (47900 Portola Ave., Palm Desert)
Plein air painters at work in the Coachella Valley as part of the California Desert Plein Air Festival. Courtesy California Desert Plein Air Festival.
Other Palm Desert locations popular with plein air painters include The Faye Sarkowsky Sculpture Garden within the Eric Johnson Memorial Gardens. Sculptures surrounded by a landscaped desert oasis featuring native plants are paired with excellent views of the San Jacinto mountains. The Palm Desert Civic Center Park has good mountain views as well.
Some of the best mountain views in La Quinta can be found at the Cove Oasis Trailhead, commonly called La Quinta Cove. La Quinta Civic Center Park is another popular painting site.
In Palm Springs, 10 miles up the road from Palm Desert, Moore’s favorite spot is Indian Canyons, ancestral home of the Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians. Within Indian Canyons, she recommends Andreas Canyon for its variety of native plants and wildflowers. Also be sure to visit the tribe’s cultural center in Palm Springs.
Midway between Palm Springs and Palm Desert, the Thousand Palms Oasis Preserve has 880 acres contiguous with other conserved land collectively referred to as the Coachella Valley Preserve System.
