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Bright lights
July/August 2005
photograph ©Mark Morosse
This brass, ceramic, and glass chandelier, originally gas-burning but later converted to electricity, was created in the 1870s by an unknown maker. It reflects two aesthetic trends of the time, says Erin Eisenbarth, acting assistant curator of American decorative arts at the University Art Gallery: "a taste for the exotic and a desire to create objects that were both useful and beautiful." The latter half of the century saw a variety of revival styles in the decorative arts -- medieval, Renaissance, classical -- combined with a passion for design motifs from Asian and other distant cultures. Designers blended these styles to create eclectic, out-of-the-ordinary items like this piece. The chandelier is now in the Art Gallery Furniture Study, a York Street basement that holds one of the finest collections of U.S.-made furniture in the world.
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