Tomatoes, 1901
Watercolor on paper Alice Carmen Gouvy, American, 1863–1924
Tiffany Furnaces, Inc., Corona, New York City, 1902–20

Signed, lower right: A. C. Gouvy /
Sep. 13, 190[1]

Marks: TIFFANY FURNACES

14 1/2 x 16 in. (89-021)

This vine of tomatoes depicted in watercolor was undoubtedly studied directly from a live specimen in a garden. Dated September 13, 1901, the study was created by Alice Carmen Gouvy to communicate the volume of the plant as it could be best expressed in relief on the side of an enamel or ceramic bowl.

Alice Gouvy’s career with Louis Comfort Tiffany (1848–1933) concentrated on the new enamel department he had first established at his Seventy-Second Street house in New York City. The department moved in 1901 to Corona, Queens, along with a growing group of talented designers, chemists, and craftspeople. Gouvy was a close friend of Clara Driscoll (1861–1944), the head of the Women’s Glass Cutting Department at the Tiffany Studios flagship store in Manhattan, though she worked in the branch studio Driscoll dubbed “Little Arcadia.”

This study of ripening tomatoes adorned the walls of “Little Arcadia,” along with the twenty other enamel department designs made between 1901 and 1902 that are in the Morse collection. Hugh McKean (1908–95), the Museum’s first director, purchased this design and most of the other studies in 1989 from Lillian Nassau (1899–1995) who had acquired them from Mrs. George Hathaway. Hathaway’s father was a patent attorney for Tiffany Studios.