In the mid-nineteenth century, most women who weren’t raising families became teachers or nurses. But Clara Driscoll longed to be an artist, drawing inspiration from nature: from every flower, weed, dragonfly, and even cobweb, on her family’s farm.
In 1888, Clara was hired at the renowned Tiffany Glass Company, where Mr. Louis Comfort Tiffany was known for creating gorgeous stained-glass windows for churches, theaters, and libraries. Impressed by her talent at choosing and cutting glass, Mr. Tiffany eventually put Clara in charge of her own staff of 35 women designers.
These “Tiffany Girls” sketched intricate patterns, chose dazzling colors and precise shapes, and carefully soldered and placed each piece of glass to create stunning lamps, murals, windows, vases, and clocks. Yet their names weren’t always credited on the finished pieces, and when Clara designed the “Wisteria” lamp that would become Tiffany Studios’ most famous, everyone assumed that Mr. Tiffany had designed it.
Today, Clara Driscoll‘s work lives on in museums, galleries, and private collections around the world. Dragonflies of Glass celebrates the innovation, determination, and ambition of the unsung women behind many of Tiffany Studios’ masterpieces.
Includes a list of places where Driscoll’s Tiffany art can be found; examples of Driscoll’s Tiffany lamps and archival photographs; endnotes; and a bibliography.
Tagged art and artists