Tetiana Pfaifer on Instagram: "The Peacock Clock is one of the most famous masterpieces of decorative automaton art.. When activated, the peacock slowly opens its tail, the owl turns its head, the rooster crows — and time becomes a performance. The time is shown in a slot in the cap of the mushroom. Today this is the only large 18th-century automaton that has come down to use altered and in functioning condition. Created in London by James Cox in the 1770s and later acquired for Catherine the Gr