Studio: international art (17.1899)

American and French Applied Art

WINDOWS AND MOSAIC BY LOUIS C. TIFFANY

(Copyright of the 7'iffany Glass and Decorating Co., New York)

Galleries, and the mere casual examination of the
cases in which the objects are exhibited, fills one
first with amazement and eventually with bewilder-
ment. It is a perfect riot of colour which we are
invited to look at, while at the same time form has
been by no means neglected, and one is able to
realise, perhaps for the first time, of what the glass-
blower is capable. For all these beautiful vases,
these graceful coupes, these flower-like long-
stemmed drinking glasses, these graceful tazzae,
amphorae and bowls, are due to the craft of the
individual glass-blower alone. It is, indeed, this
underlying principle which gives them their chief
value. Here are no forms produced by the real
worker in glass and then taken in hand for orna-
mentation by a craftsman of another order, neces-
sarily ignorant to a certain degree of the capa-
bilities of the material. It is, in the main, decorative
40

and not decorated. Reliance is placed
upon the secrets of the glass house
alone, and the result in the majority of
cases is exceedingly fine. To describe
it with any degree of effectiveness is a
task from which I must confess I shrink,
for my vocabulary would have to be
enlarged beyond the limits of the Eng-
lish language in order to render full
justice to the intricacies, the subtleties
and the glories of these embodiments of
all that is beautiful in colour. To
descend to particulars, the designs that
pleased me most were the ones in which
the decorative effects were obviously
and frankly induced by aid of the

FAVRILE GLASS BY LOUIS C. TIFFANY