Items

Blackboy Clock
A large clock, four foot by four foot with golden roman numerals on a black background, which incorporates a blackamoor caricature of an African child into its design. When functioning, the caricature is meant to ring a bell on the hour. The clock was assembled in 1774 by John Miles but the creation of the figure may predate this. At present, the exact origins of the statuette are unclear. It bears some resemblance to painted wooden figures of “Black Boys” that were used as tobacconists’ shop signs in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, but the clock was not originally sited on a building for selling tobacco goods. Many "Black Boy" names, signs, and architectural features are still in existence across the rural and urban landscapes of modern Britain. They are increasingly the site of contestation over the ways in which racism has been physically inscribed in the environment, as many events since 2020 have demonstrated.