WINTER PARK, FLA.- On Tuesday, March 3, The Charles Hosmer Morse Museum of American Art will present three new exhibitions that celebrate paintings and jewelry.

The exhibition Beyond Glass: The Paintings of Louis Comfort Tiffany presents Tiffany’s paintings, highlighting the artist’s continuous exploration of color and light in the medium. In Salon-Style Paintings, the Morse offers a selection of works displayed in an important historical method of hanging art. As the Museum’s Hugh F. McKean Curator, Dr. Kayli R. Rideout explains, “I hope our visitors will walk away from these exhibitions with renewed appreciation for painting. In the salon exhibition, visitors can experience, maybe for the first time, how these works would have been viewed over a century ago. The Tiffany paintings exhibition presents a lesser-known aspect of his career, and I hope visitors can see how his explorations in painting went on to inform his work in glass.” The third exhibition, Handpicked: Jewelry from the Morse Family, features pieces owned and collected by members of the Morse, Genius, and McKean families, with archival photographs to help document their meaning and use. Together, these exhibitions highlight incredibly important aspects of the Museum’s collection.

Beyond Glass: The Paintings of Louis Comfort Tiffany

Before establishing his internationally recognized design and decorating firm, Louis Comfort Tiffany (1848–1933) first developed his artistic skills in painting. He studied under notable artists Samuel Colman (1832–1920) and George Inness (1825–94) and soon began exhibiting his work at the National Academy of Design in New York City. Tiffany’s early artistic development in painting was profoundly shaped by his travels in Europe and North Africa where he made oil and watercolor sketches of his surroundings and drew inspiration from local artists and craftsmen.

These experiences abroad encouraged him to look beyond traditional academic approaches to art and inspired him to explore a wide range of media. Through painting, an artistic practice he continued all his life, Tiffany formed important friendships with other artists and began the exploration of light and color that would define his career. With 16 paintings on display, the works in Beyond Glass highlight this early, yet influential, medium for Tiffany.

Salon-Style Paintings

Beginning in the seventeenth century, salons were influential gathering spaces for intellectual discussion and displays of art that became central to social and cultural life in France. In the earliest years, these exhibitions were sponsored by the French monarchy and frequently held in the Salon Carré, a gallery at the Louvre that gave the events their name. To accommodate the vast number of works to be displayed, paintings were hung densely from floor to ceiling in what is now known as “salon-style.” History paintings, landscapes, portraits, and still lifes were commonly displayed genres. Salon-Style Paintings takes the form of a nineteenth-century salon, featuring 49 paintings by artists such as Albert Bierstadt (1830–1902), Martin Johnson Heade (1819–1904), and John Singer Sargent (1856–1925), to name a few.

Handpicked: Jewelry from the Morse Family

An intimate expression of personal style and creativity, jewelry is a combination of both fashion and art. Over the course of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the multi-generational Morse, Genius, and McKean family assembled a rich and varied collection of jewelry. Their personal pieces, passed down through the family, and those they collected reflect major artistic movements and represent a wide range of makers. The jewelry displayed in Handpicked: Jewelry from the Morse Family was owned and acquired by family members. Archival photographs and estate inventories offer valuable insight into how these pieces were worn, treasured, and collected.