Design for a Clock 19th century

This drawing of a clock was made anonymously, with pen and watercolor. The design points to the late eighteenth century, in France, during the reign of Louis the Sixteenth. The drawing presents a clock as a sculpture. It’s crowned with birds and foliage and it’s flanked by smaller decorative lanterns. The clock suggests an extravagant, leisurely lifestyle enjoyed by a few people. Its pastoral scene is a fantasy of the good life. It’s useful to remember that clocks were luxury items, and the passing of time was therefore visualized as a preoccupation of the upper classes. To learn more about the history of decorative objects and the social life of the French court, historians consult trade records, inventories, and of course the objects themselves. By understanding the conditions that shape artistic production, we can begin to reflect on the meaning of art as something contingent on social and institutional context.