Clown Dancer, from the Dancing Women series (N186) issued by Wm. S. Kimball & Co. 1889

This is a chromolithograph trading card of a clown dancer, made by Wm. S. Kimball & Co. Note the clown's costume, a garish patchwork of colors meant to provoke laughter, and the fan she holds aloft, a symbol of coquetry and playful deception. The clown, or fool, is an archetypal figure traceable back to antiquity. We see echoes of him in the jesters of medieval courts, figures like the Roman Plautus who embodied both wit and subversive commentary, and even in the masked players of the commedia dell'arte, each riffing on mankind’s follies. Consider also the harlequin's costume, itself a hodgepodge of shapes and colors that mirrors the fractured nature of the human psyche, its conflicting desires and impulses laid bare for all to see. It’s this very exposure of the human condition that allows the clown to touch our collective subconscious, prompting both laughter and a recognition of our own flawed selves. It's no wonder that clowns continue to reappear.