Ivory fan from the Van Braam Houckgeest collection

The fan (now) consists of two guard sticks and 22 inner sticks; at least two sticks are missing. The inner sticks are pierced, the lower part with a 'cash motif', in the center of which a shield is reserved with the initials 'CGVR' against a background of hair-thin vertical lines, for Catharina Cornelia Geertruida van Reede (van Oudtshoorn), the first wife of A.E. van Braam Houckgeest (1739-1801).

Above it, against the same background of thin lines, three painted medallions that appear to be suspended from ribbons, floral scrolls, and undulating strapwork. On the central, shield-shaped medallion a man and a woman by the waterside; on the other two, oval medallions each a putto, once by the rising or setting sun at the waterside and once in a small boat on a turbulent sea beneath a sky with lightning bolts. On the back, flowering branches.

In the tops above the ribbon, stylized pierced chrysanthemums. The guard sticks are carved in high relief with flowering branches, trees, pagodas, and rocks. The Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, holds this object as AK-RAK-2005-3; its record gives material recorded as ivory; measurements length 25.5 cm. Description translated from the museum's Dutch catalogue text; details are those of this museum object, and how far it represents a wider type has not been independently verified.