Charles Hosmer Morse Museum of American Art

The Charles Hosmer Morse Museum of American Art is a museum in Winter Park, Florida, noted for its Art Nouveau collection and its status as the holder of the most comprehensive collection of works by Louis Comfort Tiffany anywhere in the world. Founded in 1942, the museum also maintains major collections of American art pottery and late-19th- and early-20th-century American paintings, graphics, and decorative arts. Its significance rests on the depth and completeness of its Tiffany holdings, which span every medium, type of work, and period of the artist's life, including the reconstructed Tiffany Chapel from the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition.

Jeannette Genius McKean founded the museum in 1942, dedicating it to her grandfather, Chicago industrialist Charles Hosmer Morse. Her husband, Hugh McKean, served as its first director. The museum originally opened on the campus of Rollins College, where in 1955 the McKeans organized the first exhibition of Louis Comfort Tiffany's works since the artist's death in 1933. A pivotal moment came in 1957, when Hugh McKean learned from Tiffany's daughter that Laurelton Hall, Tiffany's estate, had burned to ruins. McKean, who had studied art at Laurelton Hall in 1930, recalled Jeannette's immediate response: 'Let's buy everything that is left and try to save it.' This rescue effort yielded parts of Tiffany's 1893 chapel for the World's Columbian Exposition, award-winning leaded-glass windows, and major architectural elements including the poppy loggia, later donated to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The museum relocated to East Welborne Avenue in Winter Park in 1978, then opened at its current Park Avenue location in 1995 with more than 19,000 square feet of public and exhibition space. The museum marked its 75th anniversary in February 2017 with a retrospective exhibition.

The Morse Museum's collections center on Louis Comfort Tiffany's work in its totality, encompassing every medium he explored across his entire career. Beyond Tiffany, the museum holds significant collections in American art pottery, with over 800 pieces including approximately 300 Rookwood works. The decorative arts collections extend to leaded-glass windows by William Morris, Louis Sullivan, Frank Lloyd Wright, John LaFarge, and Arthur J. Nash; jewelry and silver by Emile Gallé, René Lalique, and Peter Carl Fabergé; and furniture by Emile Gallé, Louis Majorelle, Gustav Stickley, and Tiffany. The sculpture collection includes works by Thomas Crawford, Hiram Powers, Daniel Chester French, and John Rogers. American paintings and prints form another substantial component, with works by Samuel F. B. Morse, Thomas Doughty, George Inness, John Singer Sargent, Rembrandt Peale, Cecilia Beaux, Martin Johnson Heade, Maxfield Parrish, Arthur B. Davies, Hermann Herzog, Thomas Hart Benton, Samuel Colman, Grant Wood, Mary Cassatt, Paul Cézanne, Childe Hassam, John Steuart Curry, and Edward Hopper.

The reconstructed Tiffany Chapel, created for the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago, stands as the museum's signature object. The chapel, measuring approximately 39 feet long, 23 feet wide, and rising to about 24 feet at its highest point, features brilliantly colorful windows, mosaics, Byzantine-Romanesque architectural elements, and furnishings. Fully reassembled, it opened to the general public in April 1999 for the first time in more than 100 years. In February 2011, the museum opened a new wing providing 6,000 square feet of gallery space for the permanent exhibition of art and architectural objects from Tiffany's Long Island country estate, Laurelton Hall. This wing expanded the museum's ability to display rescued elements from the estate that the McKeans had acquired following the 1957 fire.

The Charles Hosmer Morse Museum of American Art occupies its current location on Park Avenue in Winter Park, Florida, where it opened in 1995. This facility provides more than 19,000 square feet of public and exhibition space. The museum's earlier locations included the Rollins College campus, its original site, and a building on East Welborne Avenue in Winter Park, which served from 1978 until the move to Park Avenue. The 2011 wing addition specifically addressed the need for expanded display space for the Laurelton Hall collection.

The Charles Hosmer Morse Museum of American Art is located in Winter Park, Florida, in the United States. The museum operates under the founding dedication to Charles Hosmer Morse and continues the collecting and exhibition mission established by Jeannette Genius McKean and Hugh McKean in 1942. Its website, morsemuseum.org, provides current information on access and programming. The museum's role as a public institution centers on preserving and displaying the most complete collection of Louis Comfort Tiffany's work, supported by its substantial holdings in American art pottery, paintings, graphics, and decorative arts from the late 19th and early 20th centuries.