Electric Light and a Burning Fire

This early view of Morgan’s study by the Austrian-born artist Emil Fuchs conveys a key characteristic of the room: its free juxtaposition of old and new. The mantelpiece is a composite of a fifteenth-century lintel and new components. The coffered wooden ceiling comprises new and antique elements as well as painted embellishments by the contemporary artist James Wall Finn. As a fire burns below, electric lights (including the hanging fixture with an alabaster shade) illuminate the room. While sixteenth-century majolica plates were placed atop the bookcases, the fireplace was crowned with a contemporary oil portrait depicting Morgan’s father, the banker Junius Spencer Morgan.