
Rococo · 1750s-1770s · French
Production
artisan-craft
Material
silk with ivory and mother-of-pearl
Culture
French
Movement
Rococo
Influences
Watteau pastoral paintings · Rococo decorative arts
An elaborate folding fan with painted silk leaf depicting pastoral scenes with figures in 18th-century dress amid landscape settings. The fan's ivory or bone ribs are intricately carved with pierced decorative patterns, creating delicate lacework effects. Mother-of-pearl inlays accent the guard sticks. The painted scenes show romantic vignettes with shepherds and shepherdesses in flowing robes, typical of Rococo pastoral themes. The silk ground displays soft watercolor-like painting technique with subtle color transitions. The fan's construction demonstrates high craftsmanship with precise pleating and mounting of the leaf to the carved stick framework.
These two accessories reveal how Rococo's obsession with delicate virtuosity transcended borders and materials. The fan's painted silk blooms with the same serpentine florals and asymmetrical cartouches that ripple through the lappet's needle lace, both demanding hundreds of hours of specialized craft to achieve their gossamer intricacy.
These cream kid gloves and painted silk fan both speak the same 18th-century language of delicate excess, where even the smallest accessories demanded hours of artisanal labor. The gloves' embroidered chinoiserie dragons mirror the fan's hand-painted pastoral scenes—both surfaces transformed into canvases for the Rococo obsession with ornamental storytelling that turned functional objects into miniature works of art.
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