Native American Sand Paintings

Navajo sand painting has its roots in traditional Navajo medicine and religious ceremony. Native American sand paintings are an integral part in Navajo healing ceremonies. Medicine men must learn all of the incredibly detailed aspects of the sandpainting; the holy images, their placement, exact colors, and accompanying guardians in addition to all of the proper songs, prayer offerings, rituals and sequence of events. This knowledge is rarely written, but is passed down through apprenticeship. For this reason many of the old ceremonies have been lost forever.

The first sand painting aspect of Navajo religious ceremony, because of its detail, artistry, colour, and significance, depicting scenes from Navajo religious tradition are created by medicine men during Navajo ceremonies, made overnight to be destroyed before dawn. The medicine man, Hosteen Klah, was the first to reproduce the sacred sandpainting images for sale rather than for ceremony in the form of woven rugs. Certain key parts of the ceremonial image were omitted or rearranged.