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The Red Sand Project, founded by artist Molly Gochman, is a global art and interactive project which helps into spread awareness of modern-day human trafficking and slavery.

The project  first launched back in 2014, when Gochman decided to take action by spreading awareness  of worldwide human trafficking, as over 50 million people are sent into forced marriages, labor, or used for exploitation each  year. To help spread the word, Gochman decided to establish public engagement through her artwork, with her first project taking place at Miami’s Art Basel pavilion. There, she used red colored sand to fill in cracks prevalent throughout the sidewalks, with each crack and grain of sand being a symbolic representation of people falling into today’s social, political, and economic crevices.

Gochman’s first large scale earthwork piece for the project was created in 2015 at Caroline Street in Houston, Texas, where it measured 215 feet in length by 2 feet in width. The large scale art piece was created as a visual representation of the U.S.-Mexico border, where the border is presented as a giant crack where immigrants coming through are vulnerable to harmful exploitation or trafficking. Other projects done over the years include the Tougaloo College Project in Jackson, Mississippi, one at Houston’s International Airport, as well as another at the Seattle-Tacoma Airport in 2019.

Today, the project has expanded nationwide, in addition to 70 different countries around the world, encompassing over one million participants. What helped into reach this milestone was Gochman launching the official Red Sands Project website, where those browsing can have the opportunity to order their own free toolkits and sand into helping further spread the word about human trafficking and slavery. Statewide events and an official campaign toolkit for this year can also be viewed and downloaded through Tennessee State’s official government website, where the state each year helps to further spread awareness regarding an ongoing humanitarian crisis through Gochman’s now decade old  global effort.