Sand painting is the name for making pictures in sand. The Navajo Indians of the southwestern United States are noted for their sand painting, also called dry painting. The paintings are a part of many ceremonies, especially healing rites. In healing ceremonies, the sand painting serves as an altar that portrays the gods and the gods’ homeland. The patient sits in the center of the painting to symbolically receive healing of the gods.
Medicine men and medicine women get colored sands by grinding stones from nearby cliffs. They make the designs freehand and from memory, and destroy them after the ceremonies. Sand paintings were made in Japan in the A.D. 600’s, and in England and France during the 1700’s and 1800’s.
