The Man Who Painted a Mountain for 27 Years

In the middle of the California desert, not far from the Salton Sea, a blaze of color rises out of the flat scrubland. Flowers, trees, suns, and the words "God is Love" cover every inch of a 50-foot adobe hillside. It is called Salvation Mountain, and one man built it alone.

A Simple Message, an Impossible Project

Leonard Knight was born in 1931 in Vermont and lived an ordinary life - farming, military service, car body work - until a moment of faith in his late thirties changed his direction completely. He wanted to share one message: God is love. He tried building a hot-air balloon to carry it skyward, but the balloon never flew. In 1984, after years of failed attempts to launch it, Knight landed at Slab City on the edge of the California desert - a free-living community on abandoned military land near Niland - and decided to stay.

He began piling adobe clay and straw into a hill. His first mountain collapsed in a rainstorm. He rebuilt it, this time using bales of donated straw and hand-dug desert clay, and kept going. He worked every day for roughly 27 years, covering the surface in swirling patterns of donated latex paint - flowers, waterfalls, bluebirds, and scripture, all in colors so vivid they can be seen from far across the desert.

Life at the Mountain's Base

Knight slept in the back of a pickup truck at the foot of the mountain. He had no electricity and no running water, bathing in the area's natural hot springs. He welcomed every visitor - often offering them a tour himself - and accepted paint as his most valued donation. Over his lifetime at the site, he used more than 100,000 gallons of donated paint. He asked for nothing else.

A National Treasure

In 2000, the Folk Art Society of America declared Salvation Mountain "a folk art site worthy of preservation and protection." Two years later, California Senator Barbara Boxer addressed Congress, calling it "a unique and visionary sculpture" and a national treasure. The mountain has since drawn hundreds of thousands of visitors from around the world.

The Last Brushstroke

In late 2011, Knight's health declined and he was moved to a care facility in San Diego County. He died on February 10, 2014, at the age of 82. The mountain he left behind - 50 feet tall, roughly 150 feet wide, blazing with color in the Imperial Valley sun - still stands. Volunteers now maintain it so the paint never fades. Knight's message remains exactly as he left it, readable from far across the desert: God is Love.