Salvation Mountain is a hillside visionary environment created by local resident Leonard Knight (1931–2014) in the California Desert area of Imperial County, north of Calipatria, northeast of Niland, near the Slab City squatter/art commune,[1] and several miles from the Salton Sea.

The artwork is made of adobe bricks, discarded tires and windows, automobile parts and thousands of gallons of paint.

[2] It encompasses numerous murals and areas painted with Christian sayings and Bible verses, though its philosophy was built around the Sinner's Prayer.

In an address to the United States Congress on May 15, 2002, California Senator Barbara Boxer described it as "a unique and visionary sculpture... a national treasure... profoundly strange and beautifully accessible, and worthy of the international acclaim it receives".

[12] In 2013, the Annenberg Foundation donated $32,000 to Salvation Mountain Inc. for materials and equipment to "improve security and strengthen operations".

[15] By 1984, Knight had discovered Slab City – a transient and retiree commune – and decided to leave a 'small monument' out of concrete and paint.

He began work on the current Salvation Mountain "with more smarts"[16] – such as better materials and engineering, including adobe mixed with straw.

An article about Leonard Knight stated that he was a "visionary American folk artist" whose message was "unconditional love to humankind".

The museum is held up by adobe and straw, but also by car parts and a tangle of trees that twist within the dome and reach through the top.

An obituary of Knight stated that he "spent almost 30 years building the colorful mountain in the Imperial Valley desert, just outside of Niland, Calif.

A National Geographic article published after Knight's death provided this insight into the creator of Salvation Mountain.

He shared this with everyone who came to the mountain ..."The work still stands as a 50 ft-tall piece of religious folk art, and for Slab City, "an unofficial centrepiece for the community and [cementing] the area's anarchic creative identity", according to a 2020 report.