Coachella Views

Lisette Schumacher expands her exploration of light, colour and place

Lisette Schumacher has expanded her Coachella Views series with a new group of abstract works inspired by the distinctive landscape and architecture of California’s Coachella Valley. Moving between vivid pink, coral and orange and cooler shades of lilac and blue, the works translate her experience of this desert region into layered compositions that shift between movement, depth and reflection.

Detail of Lisette Schumacher’s Coachella Views series

From Palm Springs to the San Jacinto Mountains

Schumacher visited Palm Springs, Cathedral City and Desert Hot Springs in 2025. Driving through the valley to see its historic modernist homes, she became increasingly aware of the natural changes taking place around the architecture.

The Coachella Valley floor is known for its hot, arid climate, yet the surrounding San Jacinto Mountains can remain capped with snow during winter and spring. This sharp contrast between the warm valley, flowering vegetation and distant white peaks created a landscape that felt both expansive and visually charged.

Strong sunlight, desert winds and open stretches of land continually altered Schumacher’s perception of colour and distance. A view could appear clear and intensely saturated at one moment, then softer or almost entirely transformed as the light shifted. Rather than depicting individual locations, she began to consider how these fleeting impressions could be retained through colour, form and composition.

An expanded series of abstract works

The new Coachella Views works extend this research across different scales and colour palettes. Warm peach, coral and gold recall the heat and brightness of the valley, while pale blue and lilac introduce the cooler presence of shadow, distance and the surrounding mountains.

Broad movements of colour are set against finely dispersed patterns and more open areas. These contrasts create a sense of depth without forming a literal landscape. Some compositions feel expansive and energetic; others isolate a smaller, more concentrated moment of colour.

The series reflects the experience of moving through a place rather than observing it from a single viewpoint. Elements appear to shift, overlap or recede, echoing how architecture, landscape and atmosphere are perceived over time.

Architecture as a sensory experience

Architecture remains central to Lisette Schumacher’s artistic practice. Her starting point is the belief that a building is first experienced physically and sensorially, before it is understood intellectually. She spends significant time on location, repeatedly moving through a space to absorb its proportions, atmosphere and changing conditions.

This embodied research is combined with a close study of the site’s history, function and architect. Schumacher then distils these observations into her own visual language, using colour and composition to capture the character of a place without representing it directly.

Palm Springs and the wider Coachella Valley offered a particularly rich context for this approach. The region’s modernist architecture was designed in close dialogue with its surroundings, framing views of the mountains and responding to the desert climate. In Schumacher’s works, the boundary between the built and natural environment similarly remains fluid.

Works that respond to their surroundings

In her recent practice, Schumacher has become increasingly interested in how natural light interacts with architectural structures throughout the day. Subtle changes in colour, transparency and reflection allow her works to respond visually to the spaces in which they are placed.

The experience is never completely fixed. Depending on the position of the viewer and the conditions within a room, certain areas may become more prominent while others appear to recede. This quality gives the works a spatial presence that extends beyond their compositions.

The expanded Coachella Views series develops this investigation further. It connects the changing light of the desert with Schumacher’s ongoing interest in how space affects perception and mood. The works invite sustained viewing, revealing their quieter tonal relationships gradually rather than all at once.

Lisette Schumacher at Root Gallery

Lisette Schumacher’s work is held in corporate and private collections across Europe, the United States and Asia. Her spatially sensitive approach appeals to collectors interested in contemporary abstract art, architecture and the subtle influence of light and colour.

The latest works from the Coachella Views series are now available through Root Gallery. Each work can be viewed online or during a personal appointment at the gallery.

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