Industrial automaton clock: DIETTE & HOUR, late 19th century.

Industrial automaton clock: DIETTE & HOUR, late 19th century.
Polished brass, silver plated, copper, with Belgian black marble base.
Belonged to Harrie-B Lee.
In perfect condition. Revised and restored.
Measurements: 36 x 44 x 18 cm.

This automaton clock, known as "industrial" model, represents a fireman's steam pump and is a remarkable example of French watchmaking of technical and decorative character produced in the late nineteenth century. The piece combines the clockwork mechanism with a complex animation system, thus integrating the tradition of artistic watchmaking with the interest in machinery and industrial progress characteristic of the period.

The model takes as a reference the 1888 steam pump manufactured by Durenne et Krebs, used by the Paris fire department. The miniaturized reproduction of this machine is evidence of the fin-de-siècle enthusiasm for technological advances and for the representation of modern engineering in luxury domestic objects.

Diette et Hour's workshop was particularly renowned for the production of industrial-themed clocks, sometimes with animated elements, along the lines of those developed by Jean-François Théodore Guilmet, famous for his automaton clocks. In this case, the piece not only fulfills a horological function, but becomes an elaborate mechanical sculpture that celebrates modernity and the technical culture of the 19th century.

The clock and its automaton have been completely overhauled and restored. Historically, it belonged to Harrie B. Lee, chief of the Melbourne fire department in the early 20th century, which adds an interesting historical context to the piece.

Examples of clocks of this type are kept today in important institutions dedicated to watchmaking and technical arts, such as the Musée International d'Horlogerie, the Musée des Arts et Métiers in Paris, the Beyer Museum in Zurich, the Museo Nacional de Artes Decorativas in Madrid, the Umaid Bhavan Museum in Jodhpur (India) or the historical collections of the Forbidden City in Beijing.

Overall, this piece is part of the nineteenth-century fascination with mechanization and the spectacle of technology, where watchmaking becomes a privileged means to celebrate industrial innovation and virtuosity.