Sandpainting-Inspired Works

This matched pair of mid-20th-century sandpainting-inspired panels entered my private collection in 2024 following acquisition through a regional auction house in Cornwall.

Created using natural desert sand, these works are permanent adaptations of Navajo (Diné) ceremonial imagery — not ritual objects themselves, but educational and artistic interpretations produced at a moment when traditionally ephemeral practices were being translated into material form.

One panel centres on a Holy Person associated with healing and balance; the other evokes cosmic and elemental power through a bird-like, radial composition. Read together, they reflect Indigenous concepts of harmony, reciprocity, and the relationship between human presence and the natural world.