|
Back to Treadway Gallery
Tiffany - Lamps and Metalware by Alastair Duncan 527 pages in full color, $145.00 + postage (domestic $19.95 - International $55) Place your ORDER Here Tiffany Lamps and Metalware is without question the best book on the subject, which will quickly be recognized as a must for the library of the dealer, institution and collector.  Tiffany Studios – over the span of nearly 30 years of uninterrupted production from the late 1890s to the late 1920s – generated a seemingly inexhaustible selection of lamps and metalware: oil and electric lamps (including both bases and shades), chandeliers and sconces, boxes, planters, inkstands, paperweights, seals, desk sets, jewellery and utility boxes, as well as a host of miscellaneous household goods, including toiletry accessories, mirrors, candlesticks, photograph frames, bookends, tea screens, clocks, and smoking accessories such as tobacco jars, humidors, match safes, ad infinitum . . .  That Tiffany Studios did not maintain an updated list of its creations ensures that a complete inventory of its works can never be compiled. Fore years, the arrival of an unrecorded object has made the veteran Tiffany observer thing that this is, surely, the very last item ‘out there’, that he or she has now certainly seen it all, that there is nothing left to enchant and surprise them. Then, just as predictably as the fact that Tiffany prices rise year to year, another unknown model appears.  This slipcase book is an “expanded reprint” of two volumes written 25 years ago and authored or coauthored by Alastair Duncan, Tiffany at Auction and The Lamps of Tiffany Studios. The book provides an encyclopedic visual record of the lamp and metalware models generated by the Tiffany Studios. Many models are reproduced from photographs in the firm’s original albums and other archival sources; many others, however, are in spectacular color. A total of over 2,000 items are shown, each cross-referenced where possible in the Index to its original model number in the inventory lists published through the years by the firm. With the exception of a brief introduction to the book and to each chapter, this volume is all pictures, in color and black-and-white. The reader can determine the firm’s original model numbers and descriptions for practically all its wares. Tiffany Lamps and Metalware is of especial interest to today’s many impassioned collectors of small Tiffany objects, including those who purchase on internet sites, as the book contains images of the numerous desk-set patterns and other small items that circulate within the market. In all, this book presents a treasure trove of pictorial references for anyone interested in the work of the Tiffany Studios, whether collector, dealer or simply design devotee.  |