Making a second appearance since its debut 2019, think of the Louis Vuitton Artycapucines collection as the maison’s little creative project featuring some of the art world’s movers and shakers who are given carte blanche to unleash their creativity on one of Louis Vuitton’s modern icons.
The muse in question? The six-year-old Capucines tote which is named after the Parisian street on which the brand opened its first boutique and known for its extensive craftsmanship.
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Among the highlight for this second edition – which is available at the Louis Vuitton store in Ngee Ann City – is that two of the six art luminaries in the lineup are from Asia. They are Xinjian-born Zhao Zhao and the Beijing-based artist Liu Wei.
Below, we give a closer insight into the creative visions and designs of this collectible handbag range.
The Brazilian artist puts her own spin on the Artycapucines collection with impressive technical and artisanal skills. Basing her blank Capucines canvas off a new artwork of hers, Milhazes incorporates a total of 18 different types of leather which are worked to the same thickness and then inlaid onto the bag’s lambskin base to create a kaleidoscopic look. She continues to add to its vibrant, almost ’70s kitsch feel by adding a variety of textures from the use of gold leaf, an injected silicone gel peace sign, and the LV logo made up of enamel marquetry and gel.
Paying homage to his roots, Henry Taylor gives his portrait, Young Master (2017), of the late black American artist and founder of LA’s Underground Museum, Noah Davis, new life for the Artycapucines collection. Through the use of laser printing and traditional marquetry technique, Taylor manages to replicate the intricate brushstrokes and varied textures of the original painting onto the handbag.
Jean-Michel Othoniel’s Artycapucines is that of grace and joy. The handbag possesses an intricately hand-woven raffia body combined with a hand-embroidered black satin trim which is more commonly seen in the realm of haute couture. Othoniel adds his own touch to the feminine yet sculptural bag by adding large black resin beads that echo the French artist’s notable large-scale artworks like the Le Kiosque des Noctambules Palais Royal Metro entrance in Paris.
Josh Smith finds the familiar in his past artworks and projects his signature abstract impressions for his Artycapucines handbag. On the exterior, Smith’s reimagines his signature “name” paintings onto the bag’s cotton canvas exterior by first embroidering white-coloured stitches to replicate brushstrokes followed by a secondary process where fabric and stitches are painstakingly printed before the letters spelling out the New York artist’s name are embroidered across the entire bag. For the rest of the bag, Josh adds a print of his Palm #3 painting for its inner lining and finishes the bag with wooden accents seen from its top handle and LV logo.
Liu Wei’s version of the Louis Vuitton Artycapucines is provocative and brings out a retro-futuristic approach that has consistently been seen across many of his mixed-media works. Taking inspiration from the Microworld installation shown at the 2019 Venice Biennale, Liu Wei’s bag reflects key elements of the artwork in his reinterpretation. He thermo-moulds five different types of silver-coloured leather that are embroidered or attached using Louis Vuitton-engraved rivets atop the exterior, while a handle made of black Plexiglass is held in place with an assortment of rings covered in metal spheres to match those in the original artwork.
Chinese artist Zhao Zhao models his Artycapucines after his 2018 sculpture, In Extremis No.3. He transforms the artwork’s original metal components into 353 individual laser-cut patches which are then meticulously sewn into a pattern on the bag’s outer surface.