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| Click image to see startlingly large grapes. Hand Fan England, 1760-1770 The Victoria & Albert Museum |
Scenes of lush, elegant English gardens were considered suitable and fashionable adornment for hand fans in the late Eighteenth Century. Take, for example, this one, made between 1760 and 1770, which offers a lovely vignette of such a garden populated by a ruined classical colonnade as well as a folly in the shape of a pyramid. It’s quite possible that his folly is also an icehouse.
What’s curious about this fan, making it unlike other British fans of the era, is the fact that the central vignette of the landscape is surrounded by a strangely disproportionate still-life of grapes, peacocks and a spaniel. Still, it’s an attractive fan and in remarkable condition when one considers its age. The leaf is made of vellum and the guards and sticks of carved, painted and gilt ivory.
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