Glass Lighting Featured
Dr. Jutta-Annette Page
former Curator of European Glass, The Corning Museum of Glass
Cage Cup, colorless, cast or blown, wheel-cut with copper alloy attachments. Roman Empire, about A.D. 300. D. 12.2 cm. Gift of Arthur Rubloff bequest.
The Museum’s collection includes glass lighting devices from antiquity to the present. They are integrated into the displays in chronological order, and they are grouped by type, by technique, and – in the modern period – by factory.
One of the earliest most spectacular lamps in the collection is a cage cup from the early fourth century A.D., which probably served as a hanging lamp. The metal "collar" shows that this cup was suspended, either from the existing hanger or from a very similar one. A polycandelon with three glass lamps, dating from the sixth century A.D. or later, is one of the earliest "chandeliers." Equally exceptional is an enameled mosque lamp from the 14th century A.D.
The Corning Collection contains many simpler oil lamps in the shape of a cone or beaker. Such lighting devices were commonly used in public and private buildings from the late Roman through medieval periods.
The Renaissance gallery shows candle holders that reflect various Venetian glassmaking techniques. A molded and tooled filigree candle holder would have illuminated the home of a wealthy Italian patron. In the Low Countries, a merchant with fashionable taste might have used one of colorless glass with delicate diamond-point engraving. An unusual and rare piece is a large candle shade, possibly from a cesendello or hanging light, which is painted with the Medici coat of arms.
Chandelier tree — England, Birmingham, F. & C. Osler, about 1883, 96.2.10
With the advent of lead glass production, sparkling glass lighting devices came into their own. The Corning collection includes fine examples of English candlesticks, candelabra, and girandoles, including a patented and signed girandole made in England by the Lafount factory about 1800.
Other English lighting devices in the collection had not been on view because they had posed insurmountable engineering problems. A special large-scale vitrine with reinforced ceiling supports has allowed us, for the first time, to show a massive green glass chandelier and a chandelier tree, both made by F. & C. Osler Co. in Birmingham, England. These objects, which are exhibited in the gallery devoted to 19th-century European glass, exemplify the spectacular production made especially for the Indian market.
Light Bulb Tester U.S.A., 1924-1934, 95.4.261.
Practical, yet eclectic, a combined night lamp and clock from France was probably made by the Compagnie des Cristalleries de Saint Louis, 1870–1880. A very similar version of this design was manufactured in the United States by the Boston & Sandwich Glass Company in Massachusetts. American glass factories produced lighting devices for every type of fuel – from whale oil and kerosene lamps to gas and electric lights. The Corning Museum of Glass has hundreds of these objects. A notable example is a pair of oil lamps that were made in Massachusetts, probably in the 1830s.
A recent addition is a light bulb tester, made for the Edison Mazda lamp division of the General Electric Company between 1924 and 1934. Its logo was designed by Maxfield Parrish of the American Art Works in Coshocton, Ohio.
Hanging Lamp - Gerrit Rietveld (1888-1964); 96.3.41. The Netherlands, Amsterdam, G.A. van de Groenekan, designed about 1920-1924. Glass tubes enclosed electrical cord, incadescent light bulbs, painted wood sockets.
The modern galleries, which opened in October 2000, present a broad range of lighting devices that were made after 1900. This is the fasted growing part of the Museum’s collection. While these exhibits are expected to rotate in order to acquaint guests with the sheer scope of the collection, some key objects will always remain on view. They include a Tiffany table lamp, lampshades designed by Frederick Carder for Steuben in Corning, an Art Deco chandelier by Lalique, and an incandescent hanging lamp by the Dutch designer and architect Gerrit Rietveld about 1920-1924.
As this brief survey has demonstrated, The Corning Museum of Glass is dedicated to the study of glass lighting devices, and it endeavors to document their historic development.