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

Iowa in the 1920s

accomplishing absolutely nothing

but also just as a lovely little object for display

though someone would need to be pretty special to deserve one of these

the White House

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