Style Art Nouveau / Ref.15380

TIFFANY Studios, Mosque Lamp in "favrile" glass, early 20th century

This mosque lamp was created by the Tiffany Studios at the beginning of the 20^th century. Its design was conceived by Louis Comfort Tiffany in 1905.

Louis Comfort Tiffany was the son of Charles Tiffany, the founder of Tiffany and Co., a renowned New York jewelry and silverware company. Initially a painter and interior decorator, he later became interested in the art of glass. In 1893, he founded his first glass factory under his name. He notably invented “favrile glass”, a term derived from the English “fabrile” (“belonging to an artist or their art”) to mimic the iridescent effect of antique glass, achieving a lustrous and shimmering appearance by adding metallic salts to the molten glass.

The base, body, and cover of the lamp are three distinct, separable parts of the piece. The octagonal ebony base holds the lamp's foot of the same shape, topped by a spherical cap, with a matching cover above it. While the base glass is matte, the upper part is decorated with lustrous green and mauve petal-shaped motifs. When lit, the lamp emits a warm glow.

This creation falls within the Art Nouveau movement, in which Tiffany excelled, particularly at the end of the 19^th and beginning of the 20^th centuries. Its shape resembles a mushroom, and the plant motifs in its decoration reflect the object’s natural inspiration.

It also reveals Tiffany’s fascination with all kinds of lighting, from the antique oil lamps of Pompeii to the Near Eastern inspiration of this mosque lamp from the artist’s travels.

Several other lamps were made following this model. One of them, similar to ours, is listed in the book Louis C. Tiffany. The Garden Museum Collection by Alastair Duncan (p. 317), as being present in this museum’s collection.