European Fans

Throughout history, fans have had numerous roles: personal items to cool the user, tools for religious and ceremonial events, symbols of royal power and authority or important fashion accessories. As practical, symbolic and decorative objects, they are the meeting point of multiple arts.

This book focuses on European fans made in the French Rococo style in the eighteenth century and the Rococo Revival style that emerged in the nineteenth century. Sixty-six superb examples, selected from the Eurus Collection in South Korea, offer a glimpse into the lives of European royalty and aristocracy, including their aesthetic preferences, ideals and views on nature, and demonstrate the intermingling of cultures in the newly emerging painting and craft styles which resulted from trade between Europe and the East.

This beautifully illustrated book explores the fans’ thematic and stylistic aspects as well as their assembly and production and invites the reader to discover their untold stories.

Hahn Eura EunKyung is the founder and director of Eurus Collection. Most of Eurus Collection’s artefacts were collected by her late father, Dr Hahn Kwang-ho CBE, who was one of the key contributors to the establishment of The Korea Foundation Gallery at the British Museum. Director Hahn’s research interests are in the field of conservation studies and the history of cultural artefacts.

Dr HaYoung Joo is an assistant professor of art theory and criticism at the School of Arts, Chonnam National University, Korea.

Eurus Collection, a sister institution of Hwajeong Museum in Seoul, is dedicated to researching antique fans and other historical artefacts from East and West. With more than one thousand fans from all over the world, it is the second largest collection of its kind in the world after The Fan Museum in London, and the largest in Asia.