The latest film in the Getty’s Artist Dialogues series features artist Lita Albuquerque, whose work blends environmental themes, cosmic imagery, and elemental materials. In the short film, Lita Albuquerque: Dust to Dust (12:13), the artist reflects on her creative practice and its influences, from her childhood in Tunisia, to her role in the Light and Space movement in Los Angeles, to her overarching fascination and connection with Earth and cosmos. Albuquerque discusses how her work employs natural pigments, rocks, and salt, reminding us of our link to both the planet and the stars.
Albuquerque's multi-media artistic practice has evolved from painting to creating site-specific, pigment-based works in the earth, to performances, and, recently, to incorporating pigments and materials in the studio context. She explores how these materials—charged with history and time—create an intimate connection to the past and the future. For Albuquerque, art conservation is about preserving not just the material objects themselves, but the very essence of human experience—our connection to nature, time, and memory.
Following the screening, Albuquerque will join the Getty Conservation Institute's Ellen Moody, conservator of contemporary art, for a discussion on the conservation of her work and audience Q&A. The event will be followed by a reception for in-person attendees.
Artist Dialogues is part of the Conservation Institute's Art in L.A. project, exploring art, conservation, and Los Angeles’ cultural heritage.
