Louis Comfort Tiffany’s “Medusa” pendant has been listed as “whereabouts unknown” since it was sold by Parke-Bernet Galleries in 1943 from the estate of Mrs. Henry Walters. The exciting discovery of this piece is of great significance because it is one of the earliest jewels designed by Louis Comfort Tiffany (LCT). Although he had spent the last decades of the 19^th century gaining a reputation as an accomplished painter and interior designer, and for his work in glass and enameled decorative art, he first began designs for jewelry in 1902 in preparation for the Louisiana Purchase Exposition of 1904. In a small pamphlet printed at the time of the exposition, twenty-seven items were listed including nine brooches, ten hair ornaments, three necklaces, two pendants, one girdle, one hat pin, and one tiara. Besides the Medusa pendant, only three out of the twenty-seven works from the exposition are known to exist today. The jewels Tiffany exhibited in St. Louis met with positive reviews which exceeded his hopes and expectations. Commentaries appeared in publications such as The Craftsman, The Jeweler’s Circular Weekly, Vogue, The Boston Budget, Washington Life and Town and Country. 

From the early period of 1902 to 1907, possibly only a few hundred pieces of jewelry were made by LCT. In Tiffany & Co.’s 2006 exhibition catalogue Bejewelled by Tiffany 1837-1987 (p. 74), it is stated that “of Tiffany’s earliest jewels, only one, the Medusa pendant, bears the signature of Louis Tiffany.” Janet Zapata, author of The Jewelry and Enamels of Louis Comfort Tiffany also mentions that the numbers assigned to the St. Louis pieces begin around 100, prefixed by the letter “J” for Julia Munson who collaborated with LCT and directed their manufacture. In a Tiffany & Co. archival photograph, the Medusa pendant is numbered J123.

John Loring, former Design Director of Tiffany & Co., notes in Louis Comfort Tiffany at Tiffany & Co., that LCT, in collaboration with Munson, designed his two most important jewels, both shown at the Société des Artistes Français in Paris, 1906. One was the “Peacock” necklace, the other was his “Medusa” pendant which Loring describes as “more reminiscent of fiddle-head fern shoots and the curiosities of a forest floor after a spring rain than of the fearsome serpent-coiffed head of a Medusa or even of a medusa jellyfish.”

Tiffany conceived the Medusa pendant at a time when jewelry design both in Europe and America had begun to turn away from the revival styles that had dominated the second half of the 19^th century. Nature became the leading source of inspiration, as is seen in the internationally acclaimed jewels by René Lalique around 1900. Since childhood, the beauty of nature had captivated LCT and his earliest “artistic jewels” clearly reflect his observations of the natural world. In his glassmaking and enamel work, he had explored the chromatic effects he could produce in those media, and together with the wide array of unusual gemstones supplied by George Friedrich Kunz, Tiffany & Company’s chief gemologist, Tiffany was able to create jewels of original design with an emphasis on superb craftsmanship. The Medusa pendant is a testament to the artistic vision of Louis Comfort Tiffany and may be considered amongst his greatest triumphs in jewelry making.

The original purchaser of the Medusa pendant, Henry Walters (1848-1931) was probably the most important male patron of the jeweler’s art during America’s Gilded Age. Beginning with purchases of Renaissance-style pieces from Hermann Ratzerdorfer in Vienna in 1880, he would go on to patronize Christofle, Cortelazzo, Boucheron, Cartier, particularly Mellilo and Lalique, but more than any other, Tiffany. He bought pieces for his sister Jennie Walters Delano and her daughters, for the public gallery bearing his name in Baltimore (planned from 1900 and opened in 1909), for his private, personal collection, kept in New York, and for his longtime companion Mrs. Pembroke Jones. Born Sadie Green, a charismatic Southern heiress and daughter of a North Carolina senator, she had just been married in the mid-1880s when they met. Henry would live with Sadie and “Pem” Jones in a ménage à trois, known and tolerated by New York and Newport society, for over thirty years, until Pem’s death during the Spanish Flu epidemic of 1919. Three years later, in 1922, Sadie Jones became Mrs. Henry Walters.

The Walters family had been patrons of Tiffany since the 1860s, but Henry’s purchases picked up after his move to New York in 1896. In the late 1890s he acquired jewels, watches, enamel clocks, and gem-set carved ivories, including pieces attributable to Georges Le Saché. Exhibitions were always a favorite buying opportunity for him, and from Tiffany’s stand at the 1900 Paris Fair he bought Paulding Farnham’s famous “Iris” brooch, with Montana sapphires sourced by George F. Kunz, and a jade frog. From the 1901 Buffalo exhibition (or around the same time) Jennie Walters acquired Farnham’s Renaissance-style necklace now at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, almost certainly a gift from her brother. Listed in Mrs. Walters’ will is a collection of 35 “unset semi-precious stones, bought from Dr. Kuntz of Tiffany,” likely purchased in these same years and reminiscent of the collections assembled by Kunz for J.P. Morgan and Jeptha H. Wade II.

At the same time, Henry Walters was also patronizing Louis Comfort Tiffany; not a surprise as the Tiffany Studios stand adjoined that of Tiffany & Co. at the World’s Fairs. The Walters Art Gallery would receive a Tiffany glass vase from the mid 1890s and a covered jar in painted enamels, while Henry and Sadie’s private collection included a gold and cameo-glass hair ornament by Louis C. Tiffany and a gold-mounted favrile glass flask, probably from the Paris 1900 Exposition. Sherwood, the Newport house he shared with the Pembroke Jones, displayed a “Bamboo” pattern Tiffany glass table lamp in the library.

At the St. Louis World’s Fair of 1904 Henry’s largest purchases were of Lalique, but he would have noted Paulding Farnham’s “Renaissance” pattern silver, of which he and Sadie would own a centerpiece and a chafing dish. Also in the Tiffany booth, though, he would have seen Louis Comfort Tiffany’s “Medusa” pendant, with its naturalistic design and wonderful baroque opals, no doubt sourced by George F. Kunz. It is unlikely, though, that Henry acquired the piece in 1904, as it was shown by Louis Comfort Tiffany in the Paris Jewelry Salon of 1906, and Henry was resolutely against loaning works of art, after a borrowed painting had been severely damaged years before.

In the Spring of 1906 Henry was on a motoring tour of Europe with his sister and his nieces; Sadie and Pem Jones were travelling separately, after the embarrassment of Pem’s having been caught up in the Town Topics blackmail scandal at the beginning of the year. Henry’s trip would have included the requisite annual visit to Paris, and it was probably at the Salon de la Société des Artistes Français that he re-saw the “Medusa” pendant, now accompanied by the “Peacock” necklace; he would acquire both pieces. While Farnham’s “Iris” brooch of 1900 would be sent to the public gallery in Baltimore, which opened in January 1909, the two Louis Comfort Tiffany jewels would remain in New York, in the private collection with Henry’s other favorite items and the gifts that had been presented to Mrs. Pembroke Jones. The “Medusa” would be kept by Sadie until the end of her life, suggesting that this was a gift from Henry, perhaps after Pem’s reckless behavior in 1905-06 had forced them to spend time apart rather than risking their unconventional relationship in the public eye.

Both the “Medusa” pendant and the “Peacock” necklace would be reproduced in the lavish 1914 publication The Art of Louis Comfort Tiffany, the only two pieces of jewelry shown in the artist’s own deluxe summation of his career. Henry Walters’ copy is preserved in the Rare Book Room of the Walters Art Museum, with a presentation inscription from Louis Comfort Tiffany: “No. 19. To Mr Henry Walters. My dear Mr Walters - I take pleasure in sending you my book as you have been one to help and encourage me in my work. Louis C. Tiffany Jan. 15. 15.”

The Schocken family has always had a deep connection with the world of art and literature. Grand Paterfamilias Salman Schocken (1877-1959) was a world-class entrepreneur and business leader in retail and publishing, whose work spanned three continents and five decades, significantly influencing the lives of millions. Schocken was a passionate bibliophile, art patron and collector. He built one of the largest collections of Judaica and Hebrew books and original letters and manuscripts by the likes of Heinrich Heine, Franz Kafka, and Albert Einstein. In addition, he amassed a collection of fine art including works by Van Gogh, Monet, Chagall, Renoir, Pissarro, Munch, Toulouse-Lautrec, as well as ancient artwork from China, the Middle East and South America. The diverse collection also comprised etchings by important German and Austrian artists like Max Liebermann, Oskar Kokoschka, George Grosz, and Otto Dix, who had been banned and prosecuted by the Nazi regime. In 1935, Schocken managed to relocate his art and book collections to a new home and library in Jerusalem. One contemporary reporter commented that the Schocken collection “is much more than just another private collection. It is a kaleidoscope of the spiritual contributions of Judaism in the past and in the present, as well as a display of the choicest articles from almost every nation in the world.”

Salman’s son, Gideon Schocken (1919-1981), studied at Hebrew University and Oxford, and fought in World War II in North Africa and Italy. Following his honorable discharge as a Major in the British army, Gideon helped his father start the Schocken Books publishing in New York, later sold to Random House. He then relocated to Israel, resumed his military career, and rose to the rank of General in the Israeli army. Like his father, Gideon was a passionate art collector and connoisseur. In addition to his acquisitions of modern and naïve art and photography, he also pursued many artistic interests, including designing the first book covers of Franz Kafka's English publications. Gideon’s wife, Devora, was a prominent figure in the Israeli art scene, and mentor of many leading Israeli artists. She started and ran the Devora Schocken Gallery, and co-founded Israel’s first auction house. She was also co-founder and chairwoman of the Herzliya Museum of Contemporary Art.

It seems that the Louis Comfort Tiffany’s Medusa pendant was purchased by Salman Schocken at the 1943 auction, or through an intermediary shortly thereafter. Professor Shimon Schocken, son of Gideon and Devora, knows the pendant since 1959, as a long-held and prized possession of Devora Schocken that was a gift from her father-in-law, Salman. It is truly fortunate, though not surprising, that this rare treasure found its way into such an esteemed collection, where it has been in safekeeping—and its “whereabouts unknown” outside the Schocken family—until today.