Circus Fan

The distinctive red ring of the Cirque Fernando in Paris provides a dynamic asymmetrical border to this fan. Arrayed in an arc well suited to the fan’s shape, the performers appear to take their bows. Ibels was a founding member of the Nabis, a group invested in making art a part of everyday life. Like his friends Pierre Bonnard and Maurice Denis, Ibels was attracted to fans as increasingly ubiquitous objects of bourgeois life that posed formal challenges for the ambitious artist. In leaving a void at the center of his composition, he may have drawn on Japanese precedents. His choice of medium, lithography on silk, was unusual among his peers.