The Morse Museum Shines a Spotlight on Tiffany Lamps and Lighting This Fall
WINTER PARK, Fla.—This fall, drawing from its renowned collection of works by American artist and designer Louis Comfort Tiffany, The Charles Hosmer Morse Museum of American Art turns the spotlight on the designer’s ever fascinating designs for lamps and lighting fixtures.
Two new exhibitions opening on October 20 at the Morse celebrate the uniquely beautiful and clever illumination created by Tiffany Studios at the dawn of the age of electricity.
The Museum’s Tiffany Lamps and Lighting gallery reopens with a bright new setting for some treasured designs always on view and several stunning lamps that are returning to display from the vault. In conjunction with the reinstallation of this gallery, the Morse will open a focus exhibition on the Daffodil reading lamp, c. 1899–1905, beloved not only by the consumers of its day but by Tiffany himself.
Although Louis Comfort Tiffany was an international success before his first lamp, his signature style of lighting has certainly extended the breadth and depth of his popularity across America from the 1890s to this day. Additions to the Museum’s refreshed Tiffany Lamps and Lighting gallery include a magnificent 28-inch hanging Dogwood design shade, after 1900, and a floor lamp, c. 1902, with a leaded-glass Bamboo design shade. The exhibit also has been expanded to include lighting examples by other decorative art firms, giving insight into Tiffany’s achievement at a time when widespread adoption of electricity was fueling innovations in the art of lighting.
Few of Tiffany’s lamps with leaded-glass shades enjoyed the longevity and popularity of the beautiful Daffodil lamp. Louis Comfort Tiffany loved daffodils—a flower that heralds spring and is rich in symbolic meaning. Not only did he cultivate them and plant them prominently at his Long Island country estate, Laurelton Hall, he created his own versions in glass for windows, lamps, and column capitals. Through objects and explanatory wall panels, the Museum’s focus exhibition presents an in-depth study of the Daffodil reading lamp, from its inspiration and significance to its design and production.
The Morse Museum, at 445 N. Park Avenue, is home to the world’s most comprehensive collection of works by Louis Comfort Tiffany (1848–1933). These include not only lamps, windows, art glass, pottery, and paintings, but the chapel interior he designed for the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition and art and architectural elements from his Long Island estate, Laurelton Hall. The collection also includes American art pottery, paintings, and decorative art.
Hours are 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday; and 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. Sunday. November through April, the Museum is open until 8 p.m. on Friday. Regular admission is $5 for adults, $4 for seniors, $1 for students, and free for children younger than age 12. November through April, all visitors are admitted free 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. on Friday. For more information, call (407) 645-5311 or visit www.morsemuseum.org.
