Tiffany Studios

William Feldstein, Jr. and Alastair Duncan, The Lamps of Tiffany Studios, New York, 1983, pp. 18-19 and 52-53 (for the shade)

Robert Koch, Louis C. Tiffany: The Collected Works of Robert Koch, Atglen, PA, 2001, p. 265 (for the shade)

Martin Eidelberg, Alice Cooney Frelinghuysen, Nancy A. McClelland and Lars Rachen, The Lamps of Louis Comfort Tiffany, New York, 2005, pp. 132-133 (for the shade)

Boca Raton Museum of Art, ed., Louis Comfort Tiffany: Artistry in Glass, The Seymour and Evelyn Holtzman Collection, Boca Raton, FL, 2007, pp. 10-11 (for the present lot illustrated)

Margaret K. Hofer and Rebecca Klassen, The Lamps of Tiffany Studios: Nature Illuminated, New York, 2016, p. 62 (for the shade)

Alastair Duncan, Tiffany Lamps and Metalware, Woodbridge, Suffolk, 2019, pp. 226, no. 881 (for the shade) and 228, no. 890 (for the base)

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

The Oriental poppy, with its large extravagant flowers signaling the arrival of summer, have always been a popular subject for artists, and Louis Tiffany was no different. Symbolizing death because of its sleep- inducing property, as well as its blood-red color, poppies were a logical and appropriate addition to many of Tiffany’s memorial windows. He was also taken with their natural beauty, planting beds of them at The Briars, his first Long Island estate, as well as four species of the flower in the sunken garden at Laurelton Hall, where his “well-known predilection for the oriental is allowed full rein. Poppies and golden creeper steep this delectable spot in rich color.”

It is therefore somewhat surprising that Tiffany Studios did not produce an Oriental Poppy shade until around 1910, especially when considering that the more common poppy was among the earliest leaded glass shades the company produced at the turn of the century. Perhaps the reason was the size and expense of producing the model, which was included in the company’s October 1913 Price List as “1902. 26 in. ORIENTAL Poppy, dome $350,” making it the most expensive lamp offered by the company at the time, $50 more than even the similarly shaped but larger Magnolia model.

A close examination of the shade and its complex pattern makes it readily apparent why it was so costly to manufacture. Innumerable large multi-petaled flowers, some with either sapphire-blue or amber- yellow centers, are in breathtaking variegated shades of scarlet, crimson, ruby and orange-red. Scattered among the blossoms are smaller blue-streaked flowers about to burst into bloom, red-tipped green and white buds, and brown-capped green seed pods. All are pendant from green foliage with lavender highlights and against a luxuriant violet and green-mottled blue background.

The different pose of each poppy, ranging from a full-frontal view to a detail of the flower’s reverse side, the manner in which the smaller stems bend due to the weight of the bud, and the extensive and brilliant palette help to produce a visual spectacle rarely equaled by any of the other leaded glass shades produced by the company. Just as in his garden, and in his finest works, Tiffany allowed himself full rein in the creation of this Oriental Poppy lamp.