Sand Sculpture

  • Beach sand (Hawaii, Florida)

  • Life size

  • Since the late 1970s

My Story of the Sand People

For nearly 10 years after my first sand sculpture, every sculpture was a woman laying face down in the sand. The next series of evolutions came with almost the same surprise as the appearance of my very First Lady. I wondered what else I could do with her. She then turned over. Another series of years went by with hips, legs, and torsos. One sunny day on a beach somewhere, her leg came up. I was forming the thigh-knee-calf combination when her thigh lifted up. It was as though she just needed to bend her leg. I didn't do it. She did. I still have the feeling of that moment in me. So when I say my sculptures come alive, I mean it.

Now she had movement. She rolled on her side, then bent her legs. She sat up. She had a head with hair but never a face. Her feet were beginning to take shape, rather than buried in the sand. As she laid on her side, she came further and further out of the sand until only a small portion of her was still grounded.

Next, I'm not sure but I think she got lonely. Lying on her side, facing left, in what looked like a sleeping position; a man appeared. He had his arm over her and was lying in the same position, knees bent. Now she had a mate. They started taking on some very interesting intertwined positions. In Hawaii at the Hyatt Maui they went as far as I can imagine two sand people going on the beach, without getting arrested. Within a year or two, some sand children showed up. The children came by themselves and had movement from the very beginning. As you can see from the pictures, eventually there were groups of people: women, men, and kids.

All of these things happened as I have said; no embellishment, no stretching for the sake of story. Conscious, unconscious, subconscious whose to say. Only now, as I am writing this, am I realizing the evolution of these sand people, their family and friends. Just last winter, I went to Florida for two weeks to revisit my sculpting roots. At one point there were six sand folks all lying on the beach. The couple was together. A new member with some humor showed up. His head and torso were stuck in the sand. Only his butt, legs, and feet were out of the sand.

Clearly, in this interim while I've been chipping stone, the sand people have had a spiritual awakening. Buddha appeared with them: meditating, facing the Gulf. Not one but three Buddhas. I guess this is why I call them people. 

― WLN