Cowan's Corner: Sand Bottle Folk Art of Andrew Clemens
Working grain by grain with tools he made himself, a deaf artist in 19th-century Iowa packed natural colored sand into ships, eagles, flags and names that have held their shape for well over a century.
Folk art and the appeal of the artist’s story
Folk art had become one of the hottest categories on the antiques market by the mid-2000s. The term is broad, but it generally means individual works made by untrained or self-taught artists, from naive 19th-century paintings to whimsical sculptures of the late 20th century. Good folk art has a charm of its own, and in the years before 2005 that charm had driven prices sharply upward.
For many collectors, the stories of the artists are central to the appeal. Folk art rarely comes with gallery records or formal training behind it; what buyers often value is the evidence of one person’s skill, patience and circumstances. Few stories fit that description better than that of Andrew Clemens, who in a short life created remarkably complex pictures simply by filling glass bottles with colored sand.
Other self-taught artists whose work found a devoted market include the Florida painters known as the Highwaymen.
Andrew Clemens: from Dubuque to the Iowa school for the deaf
Andrew Clemens was born in Dubuque, Iowa, in 1857. At the age of five he lost the ability to hear and speak as a result of encephalitis. He spent a brief period at the Iowa Institute for the Education of the Deaf and Dumb in Council Bluffs, the name the state school carried at the time.
After leaving the school, Clemens began experimenting with sand art. His raw material came from the Pictured Rocks region of Iowa, where the sandstone yields naturally multicolored sand. The colors in his work came from that natural sand rather than from dyes, so the range of shades he could use depended on what he could gather and separate himself. That limit makes the subtle shading in his best bottles all the more striking.
How Clemens packed sand without glue
Clemens made special tools for the work. With them he arranged the sand into detailed designs inside the bottle and packed it tightly. He used no glue of any kind. The picture held together only because each layer was pressed firmly against the glass and against the layers around it.
The difficulty of that method is easy to underestimate. The artist worked through the narrow neck of a bottle, building the image from the inside, so that the finished picture read correctly only when seen through the glass. Lettering had to be formed grain by grain, and a mistake low in the bottle could not be fixed once sand was packed above it.
Sizes and designs varied. Orders reached Clemens from around the world, and each customer paid roughly five to seven dollars. Larger and more complex bottles took as much as a year to finish.
Ships, eagles, flags and customers’ names
As his skill grew, so did the range of his subjects: boats and ships, flowers, flags and eagles. He often made custom bottles showing a scene of the customer’s choosing, with the customer’s name worked into the sand in a variety of letter styles.
Two examples show the kind of work that comes to auction. A footed sand bottle 7.75 inches tall, with the owner’s name on one side and a three-masted ship on the other, sold for $12,075 in May 2004. A pair of sweetheart sand bottles that Clemens made for Henry Reinken and his future wife, Helen Wimmler, carried an estimate of $25,000 to $35,000.
Clemens also used a printed label on his sand creations. For collectors, a label is a valuable aid to attribution, though the design and technique of the sand picture itself remain the main evidence.
The window in McGregor and a short life
Throughout his career, the window in front of Clemens’s worktable was a popular place for residents of McGregor, Iowa, to pass the time, watching him build his bottles with great care. In his later years he became so absorbed in the work that he lost interest in nearly everything else, and the long hours bent over his table took their toll.
Clemens, dubbed “the portrait painter without a brush or even paint,” died in 1894, only 37 years old. He is thought to have made hundreds of bottles, but relatively few survive. That combination of a small surviving body of work and a moving personal story is a large part of why his bottles stand out within American folk art.
Collecting Andrew Clemens sand bottles
The imagination, complexity and rarity of Clemens’s sand bottles made them very popular on the market, where they generally fetched thousands of dollars each by 2005. To many collectors, though, they are beyond price, because they are tangible reminders of the isolated life of a very gifted folk artist.
Because the pictures rely entirely on tight packing, condition matters a great deal. Collectors look for designs with crisp edges and clear lettering, check whether the original stopper or seal survives, and note any shifting or settling of sand that blurs the image. Such pieces are best kept upright and handled gently, away from knocks and vibration, since a cracked bottle or loosened packing cannot be repaired without disturbing the design.
Provenance helps as well. Many of Clemens’s bottles were commissioned with a name or a scene for a particular person, and a documented line of ownership back to that first customer, as with the Reinken and Wimmler pair, adds both interest and confidence. Readers who enjoy American craft traditions may also like collecting Southern stoneware, and those drawn to old glass bottles can read about the marble-stoppered Codd bottle.
Questions and answers
Who was Andrew Clemens?
Andrew Clemens was an Iowa folk artist, born in Dubuque in 1857, who lost his hearing and speech to encephalitis at age five. He created detailed pictures by packing naturally colored sand into glass bottles, worked in McGregor, Iowa, and died in 1894 at only 37.
How did Andrew Clemens make his sand bottles?
Clemens collected naturally multicolored sand from the Pictured Rocks region of Iowa and arranged it inside glass bottles with special tools he made himself. He packed the sand tightly and used no glue of any kind. Large, complex bottles could take as much as a year to finish.
How much is an Andrew Clemens sand bottle worth?
By 2005 Clemens sand bottles generally fetched thousands of dollars each. A 7.75-inch footed bottle with the owner’s name and a three-masted ship sold for $12,075 in May 2004, and a pair of sweetheart bottles made for Henry Reinken and Helen Wimmler was estimated at $25,000 to $35,000.
What did Andrew Clemens charge for his sand art?
Customers paid Clemens about five to seven dollars per bottle. Orders came to him from around the world, and he often made custom bottles showing a scene the customer chose, with the customer’s name worked into the sand in a variety of letter styles.
Why are Andrew Clemens sand bottles rare?
Clemens is thought to have made hundreds of bottles during a short career that ended with his death at 37 in 1894, and relatively few survive. Because the sand is held only by tight packing, damaged bottles cannot easily be restored, which further limits the number available.