Dig Your Hands in the Dirt

A Manual for Making Art Out of Earth

• Turn the earth under your feet into natural, cheap, beautiful art: African-inspired murals, fanciful playground sculptures, labyrinths, sundials, sculpted benches, bird houses, & more.
• Complete illustrated how-to guide to mud, art, & community.
• Inspiring stories & color photos from earth-artists here & abroad.
• For teachers, parents, activists, builders, artists, & other kids.

Here is inspiration and instruction for anyone interested in making beautiful art out of earth. The author of Build Your Own Earth Oven teaches you to find, mix, and sculpt the right mud; develop group goals and vision, and translate simple, natural (and easy to draw) patterns into sophisticated and complex designs. The resulting murals will transform anonymous "spaces" into real places. Or make "garden art" you can sit on (or in). Get inspirated by earth artists across the country and over the sea. Extensive resources for further study. Join them all in making art to help "join us, harmoniously, to a whole." Brief, elegant, wonderfully and generously illustrated with drawings and 32 pages of color photos.

About the Author
Kiko Denzer is an artist, teacher, and author in the earthen building revival. He serves as artist-in-residence in schools in his home state of Oregon, and has muddied tens of thousands of hands with his popular oven and bread manual, Build Your Own Earth Oven.

"I love this book! Kiko Denzer is an imaginative teacher with a great sense of design who clearly inspires children . . . ! Just reading his exercises makes you want to get right down into it. Every grade school teacher should seize on this book to enrich their students’ lives."

—Dr. Betty Edwards, author of Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain

"Offers a fascinating process to help you see and understand pattern in nature. The resulting designs are utterly consistent with the process of natural design. It’s an invaluable and unique tool."

—Ianto Evans, landscape architect, author of The Hand Sculpted House