RAGO AUCTIONS OPEN HOUSE FEATURES A TALK BY DR. ROBERTA A. MAYER ON LOUIS COMFORT TIFFANY ON MARCH 19 AT 6 PM.

Lambertville, NJ:  The Rago Arts and Auction Center hosts an open house on Wednesday, March 19, featuring a talk by Dr. Roberta A. Mayer on Louis Comfort Tiffany at 6 pm.  The talk takes place during the preview week for Rago's Great Estates auction.

Louis Comfort Tiffany (1848-1933) was one of the foremost decorative artists of the late-nineteenth century, and he is still highly admired for his innovative approaches to the manufacture and use of glass. He also explored many other media, including painting, textiles, pottery, metalwork, and furniture, and he brought these elements together in the full design of opulent interiors. The years 1878 to 1883 mark the earliest phase of Tiffany’s career.  During that period, he started several short-lived business ventures, including one with the textile artist Candace Thurber Wheeler (1828-1923) and another with the designer and importer Lockwood de Forest (1850-1932).  During this period, Tiffany also hired many other artists for various projects as needed, with the painter Samuel Colman (1832-1920) being one of them. By 1883, however, Tiffany and his partners amicably dissolved their formal businesses, and thereafter each pursued their independent interests. In her presentation, entitled “Untangling the Early Business Ventures of Louis Comfort Tiffany,” Dr. Mayer discusses Tiffany’s early businesses and his transition from artist to entrepreneur.

Roberta A. Mayer received her Ph.D. from the University of Delaware with a specialty in American art history and a minor in decorative arts.  Her articles have appeared in Winterthur Portfolio, Studies in the Decorative Arts, 19th Century, The Salem County Preservationist, Journal of Modern Craft, and Smithsonian Archives of American Art Journal.  She contributed chapters to Cincinnati Art-Carved Furniture and Interiors (2003) and Tiffany Glass: A Passion for Colour (2009).  She is the author of Stella Elkins Tyler: A Legacy Born of Bronze (2004) and Lockwood de Forest: Furnishing the Gilded Age with a Passion for India (2008).  She received the prestigious Robert C. Smith Award from the Decorative Arts Society in 2001, and the Annual Award in the Category of Decorative Arts Monograph for her book on Lockwood de Forest from the Metropolitan Chapter of the Victorian Society in America (2009).  Most recently, she was honored by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching and the Council for Advancement and Support of Education as 2010 U. S. Professor of the Year for Pennsylvania.  She is currently professor of art history and Visual Arts Area Head at Bucks County Community College in Newtown, Pennsylvania.

The auction house opens on Wednesday, March 19 at noon. A reception begins at 5 p.m. Dr. Mayer will speak at 6 p.m.

RSVP to 609.397.9374 ext. 119 or raac@ragoarts.com. If you unable to RSVP in advance, please join us if you can; all are welcome.

TO THE EDITOR

High resolution image available on request.

About Rago Arts and Auction Center

Rago is a leading U.S. auction house with $30 million in sales in 2013. We serve thousands of sellers and buyers internationally with a singular blend of global reach and personal service. Rago holds auctions of 20th/21st c. design, fine art, decorative arts, furnishings, jewelry, militaria, coins and currency, Asian, historic ephemera, and ethnographic property.  A world-class venue through which to buy and sell, it offers valuations for personal property (from a single piece to collections and estates), appraisals, estate services, exhibitions and lectures in house and online. Rago is based in New Jersey, midway between Philadelphia and New York City.

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