Louis Comfort Tiffany
Believed to be the only extant example of the model, the complex Virginia Creeper Table Lamp is one of the few lamps designed and sold by Tiffany Studios as a single unit representing a living plant in leaded glass and bronze.
Lillian Nassau LLC is thrilled to offer this masterpiece of Tiffany design for the first time since April, 1995, when it was acquired for The Garden Museum by famed Tiffany collector Takeo Horiuchi at Sotheby’s, New York, where it broke the then record price for a Tiffany Lamp sold at auction.
Designed as a pairing of shade and base, the Virginia Creeper shares structural features with the Wisteria, Apple Blossom, and other complete lamps produced by Tiffany Studios. Rising from a vegetal bronze stem, the upper portion of the shade is formed by an openwork network of bronze "vines," which serve to ventilate the shade, while leaded glass leaves form an irregular lower edge.
Unlike any known Tiffany lamp, however, the Virginia Creeper incorporates a variety of innovative glass and production techniques unique to this design; it was likely a special commission due to the expense of manufacture.
Below the openwork crown, the shade features a rare section of plating: a band of variegated orange glass has been placed underneath a section of thick bronze branches. This soft orange background serves to support the hand-cut Tiffany glass leaves which form the majority of the shade, while furthering the illusion of layered foliage receding in the distance.
The method used to produce the matte glass leaves is believed to be unique to this model:
" ... [the leaves] are not cut in opus sectile from regular favrile glass but, instead, are press molded in relief. The different sizes of the leaves required the making of several different molds, and each had its own pattern of veining pressed into the glass."
- Dr. Martin Eidelberg, "Important Lamps by Louis Comfort Tiffany" in The Lamps of Louis Comfort Tiffany (New York: Vendome Press, 2005), pg. 117-118, plates 21-22.
The Virginia Creeper Lamp is pictured in the foreground of this 1970s postcard distributed by early Tiffany dealer Beatrice Weiss; Mecom purchased the lamp directly from Weiss.
John W. Mecom Jr., a prominent Houston businessman and former owner of the New Orleans Saints, was one of a wave of major American collectors of Art Nouveau in the 1970s and 80s who were passionate about the works of Louis Comfort Tiffany. Mecom was competing for lamps with revered Tiffany collectors including Sydney and Francis Lewis, Eugene and Jean Gluck, Roy Warshawsky, a Hollywood contingent including David Geffen and Barbara Streisand, and more. (Any other collectors to note here???)
Lillian Nassau sold Mecom his first Tiffany Lamp in 1974. This early acquisition led to two decades of passionate collecting, during which time he acquired some of the finest examples of Tiffany ever produced, including several lamps believed to be the only known example of model. The Virginia Creeper, purchased from early Tiffany dealer Beatrice Weiss, is one of those lamps.
Mecom's collection was indeed museum-quality, and he generously lent the Virginia Creeper Lamp to Masterworks of Louis Comfort Tiffany, a historic exhibition first held in 1990 at The Renwick Gallery at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington D.C. and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, before traveling to multiple cities throughout Japan the following year.
On April 22, 1995, a group of highly important lamps from Mecom's collection were sold in a landmark auction held at Sotheby's, New York. Major pieces were acquired by a new wave of Tiffany collectors, including Japanese businessman Takeo Horiuchi - a recent devotee of Tiffany's work - who purchased Lot 4, the Virginia Creeper Lamp for $1,000,000, establishing a new record price for a Tiffany Lamp at auction.
"The fourth turning point in my life came when I encountered the works of Louis C. Tiffany. You could really say, it changed my life."
- Takeo Horiuchi, quoted in Louis C. Tiffany: The Garden Museum Collection, Alastair Duncan, p. 22
In the early 1990s, Takeo Horiuchi came across a Tiffany Lamp in the home of a fellow collector and was instantly hooked. In addition to the appeal of the object's natural beauty, Horiuchi was particularly fascinated by what he called "the Japanese connection" - Louis Comfort Tiffany's preoccupation with emulating and reinventing Japanese art and design.
In 1991, Horiuchi attended Masterworks of Louis Comfort Tiffany when the exhibition toured Japan. This may have been Horiuchi's first encounter with the Virginia Creeper Lamp, which was prominently featured in the exhibition and accompanying catalogue.
Horiuchi sought to open his own museum to showcase the finest examples of Tiffany's work and their relation to the art of his ancestral homeland. He secured some of the finest examples of Tiffany lamps and windows in addition to rare pieces of Favrile Glass, Pottery, and metalwork. He was a frequent fixture at major Tiffany galleries and auctions, including Lillian Nassau, and by 1994 had acquired enough material to open the first iteration of The Garden Museum in Nagoya, Japan.
Over the next two decades, The Garden Museum collection expanded as Horiuchi sought out a suitable location to safely exhibit these masterpieces in glass in Japan. After selecting a location near Mt. Fuji, plans to site The Garden Museum in his homeland were ultimately abandoned after the 2011 earthquake.
