Photo By Gail

In the spring of 1911, Joaquin Sorolla visited the United States for a second exhibition tour organized by Archer Huntington. As he had done on his first tour in 1909, Sorolla used the opportunity to take on portrait commissions. Among the Americans seeking a portrait from Sorolla was the renowned designer Louis Comfort Tiffany (1848 — 1933), president of Tiffany Studios and son of the founder of Tiffany and Company.

Sorolla painted this portrait in one of the gardens at Tiffany’s estate on Long Island in May  1911, deriving artistic inspiration from an avalanche of spring flowers, with Tiffany at his easel, and his border terrier, Funny, at his side. The studied elegance of Tiffany’s attire and formality of the presentation of the sitter contrast with the relaxed pose and the casually effect of the “artist at work“ conceit, as though Tiffany were pausing mid brushstroke to reply to a comment from the viewer.

Photographed at Sotheby’s Auction House on Madison Avenue.