Boy with Dog 19th Century Folk Art "Sandpaper" Painting filagree hairpin Iowa in the 1920s

Iowa in the 1920s

cattails or tall grasses

but also just as a lovely little object for display

It was purchased from an estate in Waban

with 1 1/2" tall lip

Boy with Dog 19th Century Folk Art "Sandpaper" Painting filagree hairpin Iowa in the 1920sThis marvelous thing is an antique "sandpaper painting" a technique popular in the mid 19th century, of creating charcoal drawings on paper coated with marble dust, which creates a surface with a fine grit like sandpaper. These are a pretty fascinating genre, typically monochromatic and most often depicting Hudson River landscapes, though one occasionally finds portraits and examples incorporating color, like this one. These most often were done by