Fan

By the late 18th century, some Italian fan makers were working in London. Here they capitalised on the English taste for the Neo-classical style. This fan uses an etching by Francesco Bartolozzi, who worked in London from 1764 to 1802. The vignettes imitate relief sculpture. They are taken from a book Designs and Ornaments, published from 1777 to 1782. The other motifs on the leaf are based on illustrations of the wall paintings discovered at Herculaneum. This was a Roman town buried under volcanic ash in 79 AD. Archaeologists discovered the remains in 1738. Illustrations of them appeared in a variety of books from the late 1750s through the 1770s. The very finely carved and pierced ivory sticks were probably made in Dieppe, France.