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Louis Vuitton
Autumn/winter 2013 season marked the first time that Louis Vuitton manufactured a product designed by an artist from the Middle East.
As part of its autumn/winter Foulard d’Artistes (‘Artists’ Scarves’) project, fashion powerhouse Louis Vuitton adopted a design by eL Seed on its emblematic giant silk square.
On his rendetition of the Louis Vuitton scarf, eL Seed illustrated four verses from a poem dubbed “Venice Carnival” by Taha Muhammad Ali. He gave an homage to the people of Venice, a tribute to the beauty and elegance of this city and its openness to the Eastern world. During the 12th century, the Pope forbid any relations between Europe and the Arab world. Contrary to most European ports, the city of Venice remained receptive and open. They kept carrying their commercial relation with the Arab world selling them wood and a weapon called ‘AL Bunduqiya’. Today, the Arabic name of Venice is AL Bunduqiya
eL Seed imagined the graceful swirls of this ancestral art overlaying the Monogram pattern, one half of the design is printed in fuchsia, while the other is covered with a discreet filigree that reveals, rather than conceals, Louis Vuitton’s iconic motif.”
eL Seed has teamed up with the French luxury Maison, Louis Vuitton, for the second time to customize the brand’s iconic monogram trunk.
Building upon the previous collaboration for Vuitton’s Foulards d’Artistes project, eL Seed worked on three luggage trunks that were auctioned for the benefit of START at Christie’s’ Modern and Contemporary Arab, Iranian, and Turkish Art Sale, on October 30th 2013. Founded as a non-profit organization by Art Dubai and the Al Madad Foundation, START provides art courses and cultural education to children with special needs across the Middle East and India.
The artist worked on Louis Vuitton’s bestseller, the Alzer hard-sided luggage case, on which he left his signature, in golden and flashy hues. Inspired by Arabic calligraphy, eL Seed imagined graceful swirls, overlaying the classic LV-monogram pattern of three trunks.
