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No designers and artists dazzleglass more than Louis Comfort Tiffanyand his team of artists-craftspeople did100 years ago. And currently you cansee and experienceTiffany’s full dazzle in asuitably dazzling exhibi-tion Louis ComfortTiffany: Treasures fromthe Driehaus Collectionon view at the Richard H.Driehaus Museum inChicago. The exhibitionshowcases for the firsttime more than sixtyworks from the privatecollection of the muse-um’s founder, Richard H.Driehaus. Of the manyTiffany exhibitions thathave been staged since hisre-discovery in the 1970s,seeing Tiffany objects andwindows in the fullyrestored Gilded Age man-sion which today housesthe museum is unique.The objects could easilyhave originally graced themansion, built between1879 and 1883 byMathilda and Samuel N.Nickerson, as they seemvery much at home.

Windows, lamps, andglass objects designed and fabricated byLouis C. Tiffany and Company, TheTiffany Glass Company, Tiffany Glass& Decorating Company, Allied ArtsCompany, and Tiffany Studios are nowfamously sought and coveted by collec-tors and museums for a number of rea-sons, not least of which is their appreci-ating value. For a generation of collec-tors, it was not so.

In 1933, when Louis ComfortTiffany died, the world and its choice ofaesthetics was different than it had beensome fifty years earlier, when Tiffany

and his craftsmen had designed andmade the first windows and glass tocarry his name. These first windows andtheir unique glass helped drive the con-

cept of beauty more than any othermedium of the time.

Founded in 2003 by businessman,philanthropist, andcollector RichardH. Driehaus, themuseum that bearshis name cele-brates both thedesign philoso-phies of theAesthetic Move-ment through lav-ish interiors aswell as theDecorative Arts ofthe late nineteenthand early twenti-eth century. Afteran extensive five-year restoration,the museumopened to the pub-lic in 2008 andLouis ComfortTiffany: Treasuresfrom the DriehausCollection, curat-ed by David H.Hanks, is themuseum’s inaugu-ral exhibition in itstemporary exhibi-tion galleries situ-ated in the historic

bedrooms of the mansion’s second floor.

TREASURES BY LOUIS COMFORT TIFFANYat the Richard H. Driehaus Museum

by Rolf Achilles

Louis Comfort Tiffany Landscape win-dow, 1893-1920

Photographed by John Faier; photocourtesy of the Driehaus Museum

Louis Comfort Tiffany Humidor, c. 1902-1910

Photographed by John Faier; photocourtesy of the Driehaus Museum

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A collector of Tiffany’s work sincethe 1970s, Richard H. Driehaus hasacquired more than 1500 objects,including his first acquisition of a win-dow attributed to Tiffany in 1980,depicting a woman nestled in a waxingcrescent moon aptly titled, Woman onthe Crescent Moon and a spectaculareighteen-foot tall window depicting St.Michael, who, in a brilliant gesture, iscomposed of ruby-red garments, goldensword, lance, and jewel-like wings.

Because the Nickerson mansioncounts among the finest artistic housesto survive in the United States, the exhi-bition in the Driehaus Museum is like noother display of Tiffany glass anyone

has seen. The exhibition and its com-panion book of the same title withessays by David A. Hanks and RichardH. Driehaus is illustrated by all-newsumptuous photographs of works in theexhibition by John Faier.

In his essay Tiffany in Chicago,Hanks moves beyond the artist’s inti-mate association with New York toexplore the firm’s contribution to theWorld’s Columbian Exposition in 1893in Chicago that helped place him and hisstudio of dedicated craftspeople into theupper echelons of purveyors to a far-flung society at a key time when theUnited States was redefining itself as anaesthetic nation. It was Tiffany’s chapel

at the 1893 Fair that may have led toseveral commissions in Chicago, notleast of which are the secular panelsfrom 1894 to 1895 in the atrium of theHolabird & Roche-designed MarquetteBuilding depicting scenes from the lifeof the Jesuit missionary who traveledthe Illinois country and wintered in1674/75 in a place he would nameChicago. The Swiss-born-and-trainedJacob Adolphus Holzer (1858-1938)designed these superb mosaics. In 1897,Holzer then went on to designed thegreat marble, glass, and shell-clad stair-case that leads to a marble-and-glassencrusted great room under a vastTiffany Glass & Decorating Companyglass dome. In 1907, Tiffany Studios

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Louis Comfort Tiffany, “River ofLife” window. Early twentiethcentury. Photographed by John

Faier; photo courtesy of the Driehaus Museum

Louis Comfort Tiffany, “Garden”landscape window, 1900-1910Photographed by John Faier;photo courtesy of the DriehausMuseum

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also contributed a mosaic ceiling and, in1917, The Men’s Grille to MarshallField & Co. (now Macy’s) in Chicago,to name but a few of the many commis-sions undertaken by Tiffany after partic-ipating in the 1893 Fair.

Several Tiffany windows can beseen in Chicago churches, most notablySecond Presbyterian Church, with ninesadly deteriorating windows, including

Jesus Blessing the Children (1892),which is reputed to be Tiffany’s earliestknown representation of this subject.

The essay, whether read before orafter viewing the exhibition, presents abroader lens through which to view theDriehaus Collection of vases, metalwork,furnishings, and windows. Most of theexhibited works have not been seen by therecently Tiffany-curious public.

Upon arriving in the museum’smain hall, one is greeted on the greatstair landing to the second floor by thewindow Soldier of the Lord (c.1910),This window is a stunning study in thedynamics of what draws the viewer’sattention to anything by Tiffany andmakes Tiffany so compelling – compo-sition enhanced by color, texture. TheSoldier window draws you to the sec-ond floor, where you will see five ele-gant galleries of Tiffany’s delights.

In the first gallery, the window AGarden Landscape (1900-1910) pres-ents a sumptuous, maybe imaginary,landscape with a distant sunset/sunriseseen over lushly purple mottled hillsacross a columned terrace and loggiaabundantly alive with spots of flowersand dribbling tendrils; the windowlooks fresh and newly satisfying in thiscontext. Tiffany’s sublime layering ofglass combined with his innovativemottled and confetti glass add brilliantcolor to the luscious garden and seem-ingly endless impressionistic depth toglowing hills that paint alone or a sin-gle sheet of glass just cannot achieve.

Another room displays a windowthat will run chills along your spine. Tome the simply titled Geometric Windowis arguably the most stunning windowon display. Its centralized rococo-geo-metric-fantasy of reds and greens andlarge chipped chunks of glass made in atechnique resembling cabochons, datesto about 1890. Windows such as thisjustify Tiffany’s fame and popularity. Itjust doesn’t get any better, anywhere.And just as your chill warms a bit, thereis a window depicting a sailboat in tur-bulent seas. This rare window, possiblya sample, was in Tiffany’s showroom at333 South Avenue, New York. The win-dow was created sometime between1895 and 1902, and retains its originalpaper label for Tiffany Glass &Decorating Company.

Louis Comfort Tiffany, Table Lamp with Peony Shade (shade detail), c. 1903-05Photographed by John Faier; photo courtesy of the Driehaus Museum

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Another window, probably origi-nally for a mausoleum, depicts a Riverof Life, a theme made popular byTiffany designer Agnes Northrop, andis signed in enameled cameo lowerright: Louis C. Tiffany, New York. Thewindow was probably fabricated 1900-1910. Down the hall is another extraor-dinary display of inventive artistictechniques that can be seen both inreflected and transmitted light. Thewindow’s trees, including very fineconfetti glass, define a landscape seenthrough an inspired iridescent glassframe composed of river stones thatbecome translucent when light passesthrough them. The window is signedTiffany Studios (stamped in lead), adesignation that was already in use bythe 1890s but that only from 1902 ondefines the official incorporation of thebusiness.

Complementing the windows inthe exhibition are stunning examplesof Tiffany lamps, including a uniqueNautilus Shell Centerpiece Lamp fromc. 1910, and an Eighteen-Light LilyTable Lamp created prior to 1902.Additionally, a one-of-a-kind benedic-tion candelabrum from the 1893 Fair, aremarkably intricate fire screen, amosaic from the Men’s Grille atMarshall Field’s, and numerous deli-cate blown glass vases further rein-force the genius of the designer and thevision of the collector. But alas, allglow outside the scope of this reviewand must, like the windows, be seen inperson to fully appreciate.

While there is much to savor in theexhibition at the Driehaus Museum,for those not quite satiated, just over amile away from the Museum is theDriehaus Gallery of Stained Glass atNavy Pier with eleven Tiffany ecclesi-astical windows permanently on dis-play, ranging in dates from 1882 to 83to the early 1920s and a magnificent

monumental glass fire screen, all ofwhich can be viewed at Chicago’smost-popular tourist destination. TheDriehaus Gallery also marks the east-ern extension of the Smith Museum ofStained Glass Windows that also hassome 16 Tiffany windows on continu-ous public display, helping make NavyPier the top tourist and leisure attrac-tion in the Midwest. They, too, must beseen in person to be fully appreciated.

Special thanks to Lise Dube-Sherr,Director, The Driehaus Museum, for herhelp with this article.

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Louis Comfort Tiffany, Nautilus Shell Centerpiece Lamp, c. 1910Photographed by John Faier; photo courtesy of the Driehaus Museum