Hand fan (2961)

Folding "assignat" fan of printed design with unadorned, shaped bone sticks and guards.

Leaf designed with tromp l'oeil design of overlapping assignats, paper currency issued between 1789 and 1796 in post revolutionary France. Papers are shown in haphazard design, overlapping eachother with various colors, denominations, and dates over a light green background. There is no further adornment or decoration on the fan leaf face. No design on back of fan leaf. Sticks are shaped but are unadorned and uncarved.

Provenance Narrative The donor believed this to have been a gift from General Lafayette to her ancestor Ann Paul Matthews, as a token of appreciation, but Matthews died in 1788, before the production of these fans began in 1790. Possibly the fan belonged to another Matthews family member; the Lafayette connection cannot be proved.

Similar fans with nearly identical printed design are held in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York City), The Boston Museum of Fine Arts, and the Fitzwilliam Museum (Cambridge, England).

Place Made France