Folding fan: MAR.M.238-1912

Maker(s)

Production: Unknown

Entities

• Folding fan

Categories

• Fans

Description

Folding fan, double skin leaf (kid), painted in watercolour. Sticks of pierced, carved and painted ivory, backed with mother-of-pearl; guards of pierced, carved and painted ivory backed with mother of pearl and puce foil, and decorated with applied, painted chips of mother-of-pearl. Rivet set with clear pastes. Front: a scene of a painter and roman soldiers. Back: woman sitting on a rock.

Folding fan, double skin leaf (kid), painted in watercolour. Sticks of pierced, carved and painted ivory, backed with mother-of-pearl; guards of pierced, carved and painted ivory backed with mother of pearl and puce foil, and decorated with applied, painted chips of mother-of-pearl. Rivet set with clear pastes. Front: A painter in renaissance dress is sitting in front of an easel portraying a woman sitting in classical dress on the right. Behind her stand two roman soldiers and a boy with a shield, and behind a wall and a column another soldier. On the left, behind the painter, two people, a greyhound and a soldier are watching the artist. There is a column on the left and a pedestal in the background. Blue dominates the scene. Left and bottom border are of a red-green line and the top edging is of gold foil. Back: A woman in contemporary dress is sitting on a rock, looking in a mirror; there are two little trees in the foreground. Left and bottom borders are of a red-green line. Sticks: Four rococo cartouches, each enclosing a sitting woman in contemporary dress and a standing man playing the flute. Free spaces are decorated with coloured, pierced patterns and on the bottom there are garlands of flowers. Reverse: the patterns and scrolls are drawn in ink and parts of the couple have been copied in the cartouches, which have a gold border. Guards: both guards are decorated in a similar way with alternating scrolls and flowers on the shoulder and the guard proper, and a putto above a bagpipe player on the top. The sticks show an interesting pattern on the side when the fan is closed.

Legal notes

C.B. Marlay Bequest

Acquisition and important dates

Method of acquisition: Bequeathed (1912) by Marlay, Charles Brinsley

Dating

Circa 1730 CE - Circa 1750 CE

School or Style

Neoclassical, at the front.