Coffee Picker Clock, Empire Period, Gilt Bronze

A Nubian coffee-carrying clock, bare-chested and barefoot, in patinated and gilt bronze. Circa 1800. This coffee harvest clock depicts a Black man pouring coffee into a barrel while leaning on a stick. To the right is a palm tree (restored). It rests on a shuttle-shaped base, decorated with scenes of young children working in the fields and two applied winged flies with outstretched wings. It is finished with ball feet. The movement is in working order, with a bell for the hours and quarters, and a white enamel dial with black Arabic numerals. The patina and mercury gilding are of very high quality, both matte and burnished. Circa 1800, needs cleaning. The pendulum is missing. H. 29 cm, W. 28.5 cm. Commonly known as a "Negro clock," this clock reflects the customs of its time by depicting the work of enslaved Black people on the plantations of the New World. This type of clock was intended at that time to bring the exoticism of the colonies into Parisian apartments. An identical clock was featured in the exhibition: - "Clock with a Negro" St Omer, Musée de l'Hôtel Sandelin, April 29 to June 12, 1978, p. 6, fig. 2. - "Of Black and Gold", clocks "with the noble savage", Brussels, Royal Museums of Art and History, 1993. - "The Subject Clock" St Omer, Musée de l'Hôtel Sandelin, June 26 to September 12, 1993, no. 5. An example is reproduced in the book by Elke Niehüser, French Bronze Clocks, Munich 1999, Schiffer Ed., p. 156, fig. 240; see Kjellberg, La pendule française, p. 345, fig. C, repr.