Stained Glass

John La Farge

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This panel typifies the stained-glass technique developed by La Farge during the early 1880s. The original owner of the work, Royal Cortissoz, was the artist's principal biographer. It is not known how he obtained the window, but he presumably got it directly from La Farge. A watercolor study (Private Collection) reveals that this would have served as the central panel of a much larger window. Surrounding and holding up the Celtic Cross in the design is an elaborate tracery of vines derived from the kind of arabesque patterns found in Persian carpets or Islamic screens.

The American Wing

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The American Wing's ever-evolving collection comprises some 20,000 works of art by African American, Euro American, Latin American, and Native American men and women. Ranging from the colonial to early-modern periods, the holdings include painting, sculpture, works on paper, and decorative arts—including furniture, textiles, ceramics, glass, silver, metalwork, jewelry, basketry, quill and bead embroidery—as well as historical interiors and architectural fragments.

Metropolitan Museum of Art