When one thinks of sand art, sand castles are what often comes to mind, but Tibetan Buddhist monks have long designed magnificent mandalas out of colored sand, for which Iranian artists have put a new spin to — famous for their traditional Persian rugs, a group of artists have taken it to a whole new level by creating the world’s largest sand carpet.
Worlds Largest Sand Carpet
The unique 39,400 square foot (12,000 sq. meter) world record carpet was created by 25 visual artists made entirely of 70 types of colorful sand found on the country’s southern island seashores of Hormuz, widely known for its red soil, to create the ‘Persian Gulf’ sand carpet.
The previous sand carpet record was 2,955 square feet (900 sq. meters) fashioned on the Canary Islands in the North Atlantic Ocean, famous for its natural colored volcanic sand carpets in La Orotava, Tenerife, made every year for Corpus Christi by artists drizzling loose sand.
Sand Sculpture Art
While some people create art with paints, others use sand and seawater to create sand sculptures — some are inspiring, others can be amusing, and a number of various sculptures can leave you scratching your head.
Sand figures such as this dragon are often made on the beach in Torremolinos.
Sand sculpture built for the Lexington Barbecue Festival 25th Anniversary Oct. 25 2008.
Three not so little pigs
Homer Simpson and an ‘assistant’ with a real fire.
Six foot tall sculpture.
Andrew Baynes - who has created works of art for Disney, the BBC and British Airways -used 14 tons of sand and water to craft an animal sculpture at Vicar Lane shopping center.
‘Meditation in Sand.’ Drawing on the banks of the Thames. 
Dinosaur on the beaches of Rincon de la Victoria, Málaga.
Artsplosure Sand Art 2007.
Sand Mandalas
Sand Mandalas are a Tibetan Buddhist tradition involving the creation and destruction of mandalas made from colored sand, ritualistically destroyed once it’s been completed. The destruction of a sand mandala is highly ceremonial, symbolizing the Buddhist doctrinal belief in the transitory nature of material life.
The deity syllables are removed in a specific order, along with the rest of the geometry until the mandala has been entirely dismantled. The sand is collected in a jar which is then wrapped in silk and transported to a river — or any place with moving water — where it’s released back into nature. For this reason, the materials keeping with the symbolism are never used twice.
Historically, the mandala was not created with natural dyed sand, but granules of crushed colored stone. In modern times, plain white stones are ground down and dyed with opaque inks to achieve the same effect.
Monks working on Sand Mandala at Nashua High School north.
Before laying down the sand, the monks assigned to the project will draw the geometric patterns associated with the mandala. The sand granules are then applied using small tubes, funnels, and scrapers, until the full pattern is achieved.Sand mandalas traditionally take several weeks to build due to the large amount of work involved in laying down the sand in such intricate detail. It’s common for a team of monks to work together on the project, creating one section of the diagram at a time, usually working from the center outwards.
World’s Largest Sand Painting
The largest sand painting record measured 9,250.7 square feet (859.42 sq. meters), created in the Town Hall square of La Oratava, Tenerife, Spain for the Patron Saint day festivities on June 13 2007.
Made of sand from Las Cañadas del Teide in the Plaza del Ayuntamiento in La Orotava for Corpus Christi, the artwork received its certification from Guinness World Records, listed as the Largest Sand Painting on the planet.
The procession walks all over these ephemeral carpets in the early evening, thus destroying these breathtaking works of art.
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