9/3/2025
September is a self-contradiction. It is our ninth month, yet named as if the seventh. It marks the end of summer and the beginning of the end of all things perennial. It is the time of year that makes us most conscious of time.
Time measures, organizes and judges everything else. That is why the world’s most famous clocks tower above the places they watch over. The Makkah Royal Clocktower in Mecca is the tallest structure in Saudi Arabia and the tallest clock in the world. Each of its four faces is 35 times larger than Big Ben. It beckons pilgrims from as far as 19 miles away and even further five times a day when 21,000 additional lights flash to mark prayer calling.
In the arts world, this last month of the third quarter escorts the beginning of new seasons. In Des Moines, a magnificent new electronic neon clock, with 12 rotating faces, now watches over the Western Gateway from the north face of the Fitch Building and its artist studios. “Timepiece” is from French-Israeli artist Oyora (nee Yorame Mevorach), who has a house and studio in Sherman Hill and a place in most maisons of the Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy empire, the world’s top luxury goods conglomerate. Oyoram’s clock metamorphosizes at the top of each hour: Its hands fall off, its face disintegrates, and all is reborn.
It is a fabulous addition to its arty neighborhood and should become as luring an attraction and civic symbol as the Plensa “Nomad” a few blocks away…