It is nearly midnight, and a large crowd has gathered on the
final night of their Clocks of the World tour, to witness the
spectacle called "The Reversal of the Great Greed".
The timepiece itself in appearance is like an overgrown
grandfather clock. It is tall and appropriately ornate, in a
gothic style, heavily encrusted with "Bruegel like" peasant
figures. The eyes of the throng reach up to focus on the
double doors positioned just under the actual clockface, as
they spring open at the arrival of the appointed hour.
From behind the doors the large head of an old woman
cranes
out. Before the crowd can react, the mouth of the figure
gapes open. In the manner of a cuckoo clock launching its
diminutive bird, an amorphous object carefully unfolds like a
piece of mechanical origami, revealing itself to be a life
sized
galloping horse. As the hidden gears and cogs spin and
crank,
the horse rears back its head, opening its mouth from
which,
in similar manner, unfolds cow. This process continues with
a
goat, dog, cat and bird, each erupting and unfurling from
the
gaping mouth of the previous animal figure.
The penultimate spider fidgets on the end of the bird's
elongated tongue momentarily, before unleashing a tiny
mechanical fly that dangles on a thread just above the
heads
of the mesmerised audience. The whole process had taken
just a minute to complete. While the cameras continue to
flash,
the entire event begins to play backwards. Each creature
swallows its prey in turn, and all are finally transported back
into the mouth of the old woman of the clock, primed for
another night, as the doors swing shut.