Meet the Specialists

By Jodi Pollack
Chairman, Co-Worldwide Head of 20th Century Design

As Sotheby’s “Chief Design Maven,” I have the privilege of working with many areas of design, from the prewar era to the present day. My greatest passion, however, has always been the work of Tiffany Studios. Its design quality and craftsmanship are highly impressive, so I take every opportunity to convert new collectors. While I anticipate associations to their “grandmother’s old-fashioned lighting,” I await their gasps when they step into one of our galleries filled with Tiffany lamps and windows resplendent in their show of color.

The firm’s founder, Louis Comfort Tiffany, was comparable to a modern-day creative director at a top luxury company, overseeing an artistic empire that spanned leaded glass lamps to glass, ceramics and enamels; to bronze “fancy goods;” and to windows and mosaics. Yet it is his unique commissions that reveal its most heroic achievements in the decorative arts—what I refer to as “Tiffany on its greatest days.”

That brings us to the Danner Memorial Window, designed by glass artist Agnes Northrup. At an impressive 16 feet tall, it envelops the viewer in its majestic landscape. Four fruit-laden trees loom on the poppy-strewn banks of a meandering river, leading to mountains in the distance. The unique painterly qualities of Tiffany’s glass transport us to experience the last moments of daylight in this Edenic scene.

Tiffany’s leaded glass windows first appeared in 1880 and soon became objects of world renown and national pride. While his designs and marketing expertise partially explain this success, another reason was the creation in 1892 of his own glasshouse—a facility that could produce an infinite variety of his trademarked transparent and opalescent sheet glass. Tiffany, who was an avid painter, used the medium to create illusionistic effects, much like the great impressionists of the period.

Many of the studio’s most ambitious windows were commissioned as memorials for churches across the U.S., including this example commissioned in 1912 by Mrs. Annie McClymonds of Morris Plains, New Jersey, in honor of her uncle and aunt, John and Terressa Danner, of Canton, Ohio. As reported at the time, the window was unveiled in the First Baptist Church of Canton in 1913, where it remained until the building’s demolition in 1990. The window was preserved and shortly thereafter acquired by a private Japanese collection. Almost a decade later, in 2000, it appeared at public auction, selling for $2 million—an unprecedented world record at the time for a Tiffany window.

Hidden from public view for more than two decades, we look forward to presenting this testament to one of America’s most iconic artistic legacies alongside other masterpieces of fine art from the first half of the 20th century. This marks an important milestone for the market—the first time a work by Tiffany Studios will be presented within the context of a marquee evening art auction. Given the strong global interest we have seen develop for Tiffany in recent years, the stage and timing could not be more fitting.

By Margaret Schwartz
Senior Vice President, Worldwide Head of Department, Old Master Sculpture & Works
of Art

For me, Penelope is one of the most intriguing characters in “The Odyssey,” the epic ancient Greek poem attributed to Homer. In the tale, dating to the eighth or seventh century BC, the Queen of Ithaca and wife of Odysseus (Latinized to “Ulysses” in this bust’s inscription), proves her shrewdness by rebutting a series of suitors seeking to seize the throne while her husband is presumed dead for 20 years in the Trojan War. Her sequence of ploys—including committing to weaving a burial shroud for her father-in-law before she will consider who to marry, then spending each night secretly undoing her work of the day for three years—allow her to delay until Odysseus returns alive. As the story was absorbed into the Greek literary canon, Penelope’s image was assimilated into art as a model of loyalty and fidelity, where it has remained ever since, evolving from ancient Roman to Pre-Raphaelite works.

This marble bust is a Renaissance example of this honorable and self-sacrificing heroine from the collection of an extraordinary 21st-century collector, the late Assadour “Aso” Tavitian. A software entrepreneur by profession, Tavitian relished the living processes of art history, from attribution debates to historic preservation. A supporter of the Frick Collection in New York, he looked to the Frick mansion on Fifth Avenue for inspiration when renovating his own townhouse just a few blocks away, a landmark designed by famed American architect C.P.H. Gilbert. The home’s interiors had an outstanding collection of English furniture, which will also feature in our auctions, and a remarkable group of portraits, and exceptional Old Master paintings and sculpture.

Attributed to Cristoforo Lombardo, this bust held a prominent place in the collection, bridging Tavitian’s passion for antiquities and for the emotional power of Baroque art. Carved circa 1520, it represents a Renaissance-era snapshot in Penelope’s iconographical evolution. While ancient depictions show her hair covered with hood, here her wavy locks are visible, braided with a textile. The materiality of her dress is similarly dramatized, pairing fine ruching and embroidered detail around the neckline with wonderful, almost wet, drapery clinging to the body below. Stylistically, it is typically Lombard, possessing all the skill that was concentrated in the Italian region in the period. The gathered fabric on her shoulder can be read both as a further display of virtuosity and perhaps as a subtle nod to Penelope protecting her modesty.

The real symbolic power, however, lies in her gaze. While 18th- and 19th-century examples typically depict Penelope seated in a characteristic pose, forlornly leaning over on a chair, sometimes holding a ball of rewound thread, with her legs crossed and head leant downwards, here only her head and shoulders convey the emotion. Set in the luscious, alabaster-like face, her carefully averted eyes convey her powerful patience.

—As told to James Haldane

By Mario Tavella
President, Sotheby’s France
Chairman, Sotheby’s Europe

Exceptional in its provenance, decoration and scale, this clock reveals how porcelain was an arena for fierce competition in late 18th century Europe, between both manufacturers and their commissioning patrons. In this case, one man assumed both roles. The clock was commissioned in 1777 by the Marquis Lorenzo Ginori, son of the Marquis Carlo Ginori—the founder of what was originally known as the Doccia porcelain manufactory, a company that still exists today on the outskirts of Florence.

Carlo Ginori was an innovator in hard-paste porcelain, a material that originated in China in the seventh or eighth century, which European makers later raced to replicate. The first to succeed was alchemist Johann Friedrich Böttger, whose discovery allowed Augustus II, King of Poland and Elector of Saxony, to found the Meissen porcelain factory. In a bid to accelerate their technical craft, the Ginoris poached workers from the next oldest producer—the Vienna Porcelain Manufactory—but their creations are distinct from northern European adversaries in their decorative approach. Records show that the clock, the most complex of five created in a similar model, remained in the Ginori family as a testament to their pride until the late 19th century.

My family is fortunate to own a Ginori dinner service, dating to around 1760, which we use for special occasions. Its design is named “a tulipano” (with a tulip) because it depicts the flower in colorful enamels and subtle gilding. I have added to it over the years by buying pieces at auction. Ginori first offered the pattern around 1740 and continued well beyond the 1770s, meaning it was still in production when they created this exceptional object.

The clock’s color scheme is anchored by signature hues of pink and green, which also feature in my service. Their gracious “sfumatura” (shaded) effect is achieved by graduated applications of the glaze. It can be seen on the fleurs-de-lis above and below the modeled cartouche of the family coat of arms above the enamel dial.

Meanwhile, three main figures stand out for their white purity. Atop the clock is Time, holding a gilt metal scythe. The flanking figures below are equipped with other symbolic attributes—one a harp, the other a book—possibly to represent Music and the Allegory of History. Below, molded in low relief, are six putti playing musical instruments. They are an appropriate addition as the clock’s specially commissioned Swiss mechanism plays its composition of eight airs through the surrounding grille.

At almost 4 feet tall and more than 2 feet wide, this is one of the largest porcelain clocks ever made. It is unsurprising, then, that two of the other examples made in this model were commissioned by a patron in southern Italy. Palazzi ceilings in Sicily and Naples are far taller than in the palaces of the north, offering a suitable setting for a triumph of architectural scale and order.

—As told to James Haldane