"It looked like TikTok-famous 2024 aliens had ditched the cornfields in 2025 to gentrify Ocean Beach - upgrading the coarse, unkempt sand with sprawling geometric patterns. Spirals, peace signs, and sunrays stretched across the shore, anchored by a simple message: "Be Kind." Beachgoers wove through the designs, careful but inevitably disruptive, because this was art meant to be temporary."
"Stepping carefully to avoid ruining anyone's life's work, I made my way over to Amador. ' Sorry... ' I utilized all my body language capacity to express how bad I felt for stepping on a meticulously-crafted sand drawing of sun rays as I approached him. 'Oh, I wouldn't worry about that,' he shrugged off my concern for the permanence of the artwork."
Ocean Beach became a temporary gallery where dozens of people raked expansive geometric patterns into the sand. Artists and volunteers created spirals, peace signs, sunrays and large motifs anchored by the message "Be Kind." Attendees wove through the designs, respecting but sometimes disrupting the work because the pieces were intentionally ephemeral. A young volunteer, Kavi Amador, greeted visitors and directed them to his father, land artist Andrés Amador, who encouraged a relaxed view of impermanence. The event emphasized communal creativity, participatory public art, and the inevitability of nature reclaiming the shore when waves eventually erased the raked masterpieces.
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