STYLE: Furniture, Silver, Ceramics
STYLE: Furniture, Silver, Ceramics
Property from a Distinguished Private Collection, Washington, D.C.
AN ENGLISH GEORGE III GILT BRONZE MANTLE CLOCK BY TIMOTHY WILLIAMSON, LONDON, MADE FOR THE CHINESE MARKET, CIRCA 1780
Lot Closed
October 21, 02:37 PM GMT
Estimate
25,000 - 35,000 USD
Lot Details
Description
Property from a Distinguished Private Collection, Washington, D.C.
AN ENGLISH GEORGE III GILT BRONZE MANTLE CLOCK BY TIMOTHY WILLIAMSON, LONDON, MADE FOR THE CHINESE MARKET, CIRCA 1780
in the form of a large bull standing on a rectangular base, mounted with metal garlands of pink and clear glass beads around the dial, and metal rosettes of pink and clear glass beads in the corners of the base; the pierced sides of the base, rear door and hood backed with later pink silk; the quarter chiming movement engraved Tim Williamson London, double fusee rear setting with anchor recoil escapement; face with seconds hand
height 23 in.; width 12 ½ in.; depth 5 ½ in.
58.5 cm; 31.75 cm; 14 cm
Pelham Galleries, London, 1996
Timothy Williamson is recorded working in London from 1768-1788, first in Fleet Street and later Great Russell Street, and was a noted maker of watches and musical clocks. Like his contemporary James Cox he specialized in supplying clocks and automata for export to the Ottoman and Chinese Empires, and like Cox may have been more a goldsmith rather than an horologist by training. His mechanics may have been supplied by other clockmakers such as William Hughes in High Holborn.
Numerous musical clocks by Williamson were sent to the Chinese Emperor and are today in the Beijing Palace Musem. Five examples of these are illustrated in National Palace Museum, ed., Palace Museum Clocks, Beijing: The Forbidden Palace Publishing House, 2004, pp.117, 123, 150, 158 and 160. His masterpiece is the spectacular pagoda-from automaton clock, also in the Palace Museum, produced in collaboration with the Swiss Jacquet-Droz family, which incorporates a Chinese calligrapher in 18th-century European dress writing a scroll in Chinese characters.
As the ox is one of the animals of the Chinese Zodiac, it is possible this clock was produced in connection with the Chinese New Year. During Williamson's documented period of activity, years of the ox fell in 1769 and 1781.