Tiffany Studios

The Collection of Walter P. Chrysler, Jr.

The Estate of Walter P. Chrysler, Jr., Sotheby's New York, June 16, 1989, lot 393

William Feldstein, Jr. and Alastair Duncan, The Lamps of Tiffany Studios, New York, 1983, pp. 158-159 (for the present lot illustrated)

Boca Raton Museum of Art, ed., Louis Comfort Tiffany: Artistry in Glass, The Seymour and Evelyn Holtzman Collection, Boca Raton, FL, 2007, pp. 36-37 (for the present lot illustrated)

Alastair Duncan, Tiffany: Lamps and Metalware, Woodbridge, Suffolk, 2019, p. 185, no. 741 (for the present lot illustrated)

Boca Raton Museum of Art, Louis Comfort Tiffany: Artistry in Glass, The Seymour and Evelyn Holtzman Collection, Boca Raton, FL, 2007

Louis Tiffany was enamored with all flowering vines, but perhaps none as much as the wisteria. Native to Asia, the Japanese variety, originally simply known as the “blue vine,” was introduced to the United States in 1830 and soon named after the American anatomist and physician Caspar Wistar. Tiffany was an avid collector of Asian arts and crafts and was likely well aware that the wisteria in Japan symbolized long life and immortality, as well as signifying love and tenderness. His affection for the plant is even apparent in his landscaping of Laurelton Hall, Tiffany’s Long Island mansion, where he planned for wisteria to grow over large sections of the structure and elsewhere on the estate. That, along with the vine’s rapid popularity, led directly to the incorporation of the plant in all aspects his decorative designs.

It is no surprise that Tiffany Studios decided to transform the wisteria into a leaded glass lamp shade. Clara Driscoll, the head of the firm’s Women’s Glass Cutters Department, is credited with the design, most probably with Louis Tiffany’s guidance and suggestions. The lamp made its first appearance in late 1901 and received immediate critical recognition. Although priced at the exorbitant sum of $400, the model soon became one of the company’s best-selling lamps.

The example offered here is apparently unique. The standard Wisteria shade features a steeply shouldered form with straight sides, an irregular lower border and a cast bronze openwork top. This particular shade, however, was constructed on the same block as the company’s model 1539, the 22-inch Laburnum, which explains why it is numbered as such and not 342, the model number for the standard Wisteria shade.

It is a wonder why the shade was never duplicated as it could be considered a superior design. While the bronze openwork top of the standard model offers the firm an opportunity to exhibit the casting skills of its foundry, it unfortunately allows for a considerable amount of light seepage and areas of impenetrable darkness. In this instance, however, the entire shade is replete with exceptional Favrile glass depicting lush opalescent racemes, in shades of navy, blue, teal and purple-streaked pearlescent white, that descend to the irregular lower border.

These blossoms are interspersed with vibrant yellow-tinged green foliage pendant from sinuous amber-brown branches. And unlike the stiff form of the basic Wisteria shade, the undulating shape of this example creates a distinct sense of the blossoms being rustled by a gentle summer breeze.

The Wisteria lamp provides one of the finest pieces of evidence of the extraordinary skills possessed by the “Tiffany Girls.” A magnitude of pieces of glass had to be individually inspected, chosen, cut and fitted to create a magnificent illusion of pendulous wisteria blossoms. This rare and exceptional example equally and beautifully demonstrates Louis Tiffany’s unsurpassed genius in translating his deep love of nature into iconic works of art.