Clock 1879

Editor: Here we have "Clock," a ceramic and stoneware sculpture made around 1879 by J. and J. G. Low Art Tile Works. It's currently housed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. I'm immediately drawn to how the warm earth tones give it this really comforting, almost nostalgic feel. What do you make of this piece? Curator: You know, it does feel like a warm hug from the past, doesn’t it? For me, it whispers stories of the Arts and Crafts movement, a time when folks yearned for handcrafted beauty in a world increasingly dominated by machines. I find myself wondering about the hands that painstakingly crafted each ceramic detail, each swirling vine and geometric flourish. What do you think their days were like? What stories would they tell about the future they could not know? And, this particular example… well, does it seem at all eccentric to you? Editor: Eccentric in what way? The mix of the almost industrial-looking metal frame and the delicate ceramic work? Curator: Precisely! It is that marriage of styles that tickles my brain. And there are, literally, gears and cogs! There's this push and pull that makes me think about our relationship to time. Are we masters of our own clock, or are we, in fact, subjects *of* the clock itself? Perhaps those makers, living through an industrial revolution, hoped the clock, if ornamented just so, could become an object of beauty. Editor: I hadn't considered that before, but it does put the clock in a different light. It’s not just a functional object, but a statement, a sort of…time capsule, perhaps? Curator: Ah, a *time* capsule, literally and figuratively! Perhaps it asks more than it answers. Editor: Absolutely! I'm leaving this conversation thinking of time a bit differently!