Ninah Kopel takes a look at the latest time-inspired designs from Canada – 24 Hours in the Life of a Swiss Cuckoo Clock.
What happens when you ask Swiss design students to reinvent the cuckoo clock? A once antiquated time piece is teleported through time into the realm of modern technology. 24 Hours in the Life of a Swiss Cuckoo Clock is a new exhibit at the UQAM Centre de Design. With a piece for every hour of the day, designer Claudio Colucci is reinventing the old time piece, and challenging audiences to think about the way they tell time. But are they clocks or art? Are they eclectic and old fashioned, or streamline and modern? While the chirp of the cuckoos may not be answering these questions, they do break modern barriers between art and functionality.
1.
The first cuckoo clock was the Rooster’s crow, announcing each passing hour. Flash forward to the present, and this clock makes time-telling an art
2.
Traditional cuckoo clocks portrayed an Alpine lifestyle, and were made from Black Forest carved-wood. This clock is made from more modern materials, but it chimes on the hour all the same.
3.
Does it get any more contemporary than this? If you took it to a clock making shop in the 18th century, they wouldn’t know which way was 12.
4.
This piece not only tells the time, but seems to bend it. Three little cuckoo birds reflect on how our modern technology is defining the way we live.
5.
An apartment block has replaced a French chalet, and yet time is still passing. Is that a cuckoo I hear singing out from a city balcony?
