author too seriously, and although his suggested fan, if carried out, would be a most exquisite experience, especially if drawn with the power of a Gavarni, or designed with the skill of a Sambourne or a Caran d’Ache, the opportunity afforded to the painter by the full space of the mount far outweighs any slight disturbance of the design caused by the pleating; moreover, is it not a fact that silk, the material most favoured by modern artists, which, when prepared with rice size and stretched, offers as suitable a material as could be desired for the free play of the brush, opens out to practically a flat surface?
George Augustus Sala has referred to the fan painted by Sir Matthew Digby Wyatt with the subject of the ‘Triumph of Love,’ as marking the period of the English revival of fan painting, and as a striking exemplification of the folly of assuming that a great artist derogates from the dignity of his calling by painting fans. He may stoop, indeed, says this author felicitously, but it will be to conquer!
Our task is at length completed; we have endeavoured to trace to its source in the dimmest past the chequered history of this little toy, once the pride and the glory of kings, and now the plaything of queens. We trust we have shown that, in the words of Sir George Birdwood, there is perhaps more in a fan than was dreamt of in Johnson’s matter-of-fact definition:—‘An instrument used by ladies to move the air and cool themselves.’
What, then, of the future? May we reasonably look forward in this twentieth century for a renaissance of the fan; for a re-attainment, if not of its past spiritual significance, at least of something of its artistic possibilities?
| Sketch Design for Fan, | by Frank Brangwyn, A.R.A. |
| A Garland of Children, | by G. Woolliscroft Rhead. |
The future is full of hope; we have turned our backs upon the bad old nineteenth century, with its manifold outrages upon the æsthetic sense; the foundations, at any rate, of a living art have begun to be laid—were begun, as a matter of fact, by this same nineteenth century, following that strange natural order of the outcome of good from evil and the apparent inseparability of both; a new Phœnix has arisen out of the ashes of the old; a new era has come, showing everywhere signs of a revived artistic life, with plenty of capable heads to invent and willing hands to carry out. Mesdames, it is with your charming selves that the issue rests. You have but to utter the word and your sceptre shall again become a wonder of wreathed beauty and woven grace, rivalling in its blossoming the golden-flowered sceptres of eld![175]
