October 1, 2024, 5:59 am | Read time: 2 minutes
Andres Amador from San Francisco transforms beaches into giant canvases. Using a rake, he draws gigantic patterns full of magic in the sand. TRAVELBOOK shows a selection of his ephemeral works of art.
A rake is his paintbrush, the beach his canvas. The American “Earthscape artist” Andres Amador transforms the beaches of California into temporary works of art.
The gigantic shapes stretch over tens of meters, some of which are erased by the sea as they are created. Andres Amador and his helpers only have about two hours to complete a picture before the tide comes in. The best time to work is when the moon is full, i.e., when the water is at its lowest, which offers him the largest possible canvas on the beach.
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Magical patterns
Speaking of the moon. Andres Amador claims to have been reborn several times since his birth in 1971. He currently lives as a sand artist. The process of creating his sand paintings is also a spiritual experience for him. Using his rake and his whole body, he enters the meditative creation phase and becomes one with his work.
The idea of embellishing beaches with ephemeral artworks came to the artist one day when he was drawing signs and calligraphy in the sand with his walking stick. Today, he is inspired by a wide variety of patterns: crop circles, sacred symbols, mandalas, organic patterns, or simply chaos.
Since then, Andres Amador has been busy on US beaches and around the world, alone or with helpers he recruits from his playa painting workshops, for example, but his favorite spot is Ocean Beach on the coast of his home city of San Francisco.
The original of this article was published in 2016.