Henry Holiday

HenryHoliday (1839–1927) was a polymath who counted figures such as Lewis Carroll,William Morris, Edward Burne-Jones and Emmeline Pankhurst as his friends. Mostsignificantly, he was unquestionably one of the greatest stained-glass artistsof the Victorian-Edwardian period, yet his considerable achievements have not received the recognition that they deserve.

Taking Holiday’s commissions for New York State churches as itsfocus, George Bryant’s ground-breaking study places the artist’s transatlanticaccomplishments in the context of the social, artistic, religious and economicshifts that shaped his success in the US during America’s Gilded Age – a periodwhere existing social hierarchies were challenged by new money and European immigration that ended with the outbreak of the First World War. Alsoproviding a clear understanding of the technical and aesthetic differences thatset Holiday's stained glass apart from that of his contemporaries such asEdward Burne-Jones, La Farge, and Tiffany, Bryant's truly original publication, based on substantial archivalresearch, makes a significant contribution to our understanding ofnineteenth-century stained-glass design and Henry Holiday's important achievements.