Posted November
24, 2009 The American première of “Tiffany: Color and Light” will be at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in Richmond beginning May 29. VMFA will be the only American museum to show the exhibition, which will continue through Aug. 15. The exhibition is one of the most significant ever mounted of works by the master of American glass, Louis Comfort Tiffany. VMFA Director Alex Nyerges calls the show “dazzling.” “Tiffany: Color and Light” will be the first major exhibition to be shown at VMFA after the grand opening May 1 of the James W. and Frances G. McGlothlin Wing, now under construction. “The Tiffany exhibition will be the first of many international exhibitions in the expanded Virginia Museum of Fine Arts,” Nyerges says. When the museum reopens, “gallery space will be 50 percent larger and special-exhibition space will double,” he said. “We will be able to accommodate much larger and more extensive special exhibitions than ever before in our history,” he said. The expansion will add some 165,000 square feet to VMFA's previously existing 380,000 square feet. “The Tiffany exhibition will occupy 8,500 square feet of the 12,000 square feet of special-exhibition space in the new wing,” he said. Conceived by the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts and organized in collaboration with VMFA and the Musée du Luxembourg, “Tiffany: Color and Light” celebrates the work of the renowned designer who achieved original and spectacular effects in hand-blown glass vessels, leaded glass windows and lamps, and other decorative objects. “Our own large treasure of works by Tiffany makes Richmond an ideal venue, and we are delighted to have been able to lend 14 important works to the show,” Nyerges said. The exhibition’s approximately 170 objects will include blown-glass vessels; lamps; leaded-glass windows; and decorative objects such as mosaics, bronzes and jewelry; along with paintings, watercolors, architectural elements and silver. Four of the windows, created for the Erskine and American United Church in Montreal, have never before been shown in the United States. Tiffany (1848-1933) took advantage of the new technology of electric lighting to reveal the jewel-like hues and sparkle of his leaded-glass lampshades. The wide popularity of his lamps made Tiffany’s a household name. “Visitors to the exhibition will see first-hand evidence of Tiffany’s love of exoticism, rich ornament, fine craftsmanship, and the abstract qualities of color that placed him squarely in many of the artistic movements of his time, from Arts and Crafts and the American Aesthetic Movement to Art Nouveau and Symbolism,” says Barry Shifman, VMFA’s Sydney and Frances Lewis Family Curator of Decorative Arts from 1890 to the Present. The exhibition debuted at the Musée du Luxembourg in Paris in September and will then travel to the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts for a showing from Feb. 11 to May 2. The exhibition’s curators are Rosalind Pepall, senior curator of decorative arts at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts; Alice Cooney Frelinghuysen, who is the Anthony W. and Lulu C. Wang Curator of American Decorative Arts at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York; and Martin Eidelberg, professor emeritus of art history at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, N.J. The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts is on the Boulevard at Grove Avenue. The VMFA galleries are off view until the museum’s grand re-opening May 1. VMFA is an educational institution of the Commonwealth of Virginia. For additional information, telephone (804) 340-1400 or visit the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts Web site, www.vmfa.museum. Checklist of Tiffany windows in Virginia (PDF) FOR ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:
Suzanne Hall, 804/204-2704; or Sarah Pennington, 804/204-2701;
Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, 200 N. Boulevard, Richmond VA 23220-4007;
FAX 804/204-2707; e-mail suzanne.hall@vmfa.museum.
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CAPTION: This Tiffany Glass and Decorating Company "Cobweb" lamp from about 1899-1900 will be on view in "Tiffany: Color and Light" at VMFA. It is made of leaded glass, glass mosaic tiles, and bronze. It was designed by Clara Driscoll. (Photo by Katherine Wetzel; © 2009 Virginia Museum of Fine Arts)
CAPTION: The "Angel of Resurrection" window, circa 1931, is just over 6 feet tall and is from the collection of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (Photo © 2009 Montreal Museum of Fine Arts)
CAPTION: Tiffany created this version of his "Peacock Vase" in 1899 using favrile glass, silver gilt, enamel and rubies. It stands 5-9/16 inches tall. (Image courtesy Corning Museum of Glass)
CAPTION: This Tiffany leaded-glass window, "Magnolias," ca. 1900, was designed by Agnes Northrop. It measures 57-1/8 by 34-3/8 inches. (Image courtesy the State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia)
CAPTION: VMFA Director Alex Nyerges (left) chats at the Musée du Luxembourg with Robin Nicholson, VMFA's deputy director for exhibitions, and Anne Eschapasse, executive assistant for special exhibitions at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts. The three attended the Paris opening of the show of Louis Comfort Tiffany works that will be on view at VMFA in May. (VMFA photo by Jay Paul)
CAPTION: At the Paris preview of a show of works by Louis Comfort Tiffany, two windows created for the Erskine and American United Church in Montreal are seen at left, while VMFA's Wisteria Lamp is seen in the foreground. The exhibition will open at VMFA in May. (VMFA photo by Jay Paul)
CAPTION: Two visitors at preview at the Musée du Luxembourg the Paris admire works by Louis Comfort Tiffany. The exhibition will have its exclusive American showing at VMFA beginning in May. (VMFA photo by Jay Paul)
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