37"w x 32" h x 9"d. A fine painting with rich vivid colors depicting a bustling village blacksmith shop is set within a gilded gesso-over-wooden frame with scroll and foliage decorations. The blacksmith shop is seen from the inside, looking over the workings of the shop and out through a wide arched open door into the town with winding narrow streets, mountains and blue sky in the background. Sunlight pours into the shop from the doorway and upper windows creating an excellent effect and highlighting the mechanical action. There is a working porcelain-face clock in the village tower that is seen through the open doorway. The clock has silk thread suspension pendulum that strikes the hours and half-hours. The two-tune musical movement from 1890 period winds separately from the right side, but is set into play at the same time as the animation motor is started. The clock is signed Tharin a Paris.
Movements: There are six people, a horse and a dog in the highly animated scene that includes motions of the bellows, the workers, the horse being shod, and the wagging tail of the dog.
Historical References: The painting was one of the most favored themes of makers of mechanical tableaux, and appeared in many variations ranging from gilt-framed paintings, to clocks, to paintings with clocks. the clock, #10 of the book, features the identical painting. Still another example is the National Museum in Utrecht, Netherlands. The painter of the scene is not known as none of the paintings were signed, but it is documented that a certain Charles Riviere (1848 - 1920) was recorded as working with Tharin and specialized in tableaux mecaniques. In an 1785 book by Hervieux, the author noted that the serinette had become as useful for entertaining persons as for teaching canaries, and when on to add "Ordinarily the cases are made of walnut wood which is the best wood for this and the most uniform".