As the official champagne partner of Art Basel in Miami Beach, each year Ruinart showcases a recent collaboration from a contemporary artist or designer. In past years they’ve collaborated with Erwin Olaf, Georgia Russell, Dustin Yellin, and Piet Hein Eek.
This year in Miami, they’ll present a sculpture by Jaume Plensa. The work was created especially for Ruinart by the Spanish artist, known for his figurative forms made from symbols and letters. Ruinart is the oldest champagne house, and the piece pays homage to Dom Thierry Ruinart, the monk who inspired the creation of the Maison.
Courtesy of Ruinart
Plensa has created a larger-than-life silhouette from stainless steel letters and numerals, pulling from eight different languages, including Latin, Greek, Arabic, Hebrew, Chinese, Japanese, Russian, and Hindi. Said the artist of this choice, “Each alphabet is of such extraordinary beauty because I believe it is the most accurate representation of a culture…All the letters of the alphabet are there, it’s like I had a palette of colors. You imagine the piece but the piece becomes fantastic when the letter is the body.” The symbols spill past the crouched figure onto the ground, calling to mind the roots of a grape vine. On the bottom are the dates 1729 and 2016, relating past to present.
Taking nearly five months to create, the artist also designed 20-piece limited-edition box for a magnum of Ruinart Blanc de Blancs in cut metal. As with the sculpture, light shines through the metalwork to cast a complicated mix of shadows and moments of sparkling light.
