About 47 miles south of the town of Antofagasta, in a barren stretch of the Pan-American Highway in the Atacama Desert, a 36-foot-tall hand protrudes from the sand. It appears that a giant was buried in a sandstorm, but this isn’t a mirage. Mano de Desierto—or Hand of the Desert—was built in the early ‘80s by the Chilean sculptor Mario Irarrázabal. And it isn’t the only disturbing hand of Irarrázabal’s: Monument to the Drowned is a similar sculpture, rising from the ground near the beach in Punta del Este, a resort town in Uruguay.