Movement is an art in itself. It expresses feelings before words do, it signals connections between two people, and small acts of touch turn strangers into lovers. To encapsulate the magic of movement, the Switzerland-based brand La Prairie teamed up with the Taiwanese new media artist and choreographer Wen-Chi Su to celebrate their new product range with a performance held during the sunrise and sunset over the course of Art Miami 2021.
Image Courtesy of La Prairie
Worshipping their heritage and their homeland Switzerland, the brand and the artist wanted to feel inspired by the majestic nature and culture surrounding them. Skies as blue as the deepest ocean, mountains so scenic a painter could have drawn them, and cities to idyllic as if they were set in scene in a film. Adding to this vision of Switzerland, the artist put a special emphasis on the water. To visualise this, her dance is a special dialogue with the water, observing the dynamic of it whilst creating her own vision of the element. “For this dance, I am much slower than normal”, she states, “water naturally flows fast but its good to slow it down to experience the of each minute, each second. This gaze of slowness, a time freeze, is an opportunity for us to be reflective”, she adds.
Teaming up the two like-minded souls, was a “meeting of minds” a match made in heaven, or spirituality. Trusting their instincts, they quickly found a collaborative basis, uniting their essences into one. Devoted to science, art and precision, the two were never lost but found each other nevertheless. Wen-Chi is telling the story of an encounter of light and water, through her medium of dance: “I thought about time a lot in this piece. The body is never still or unchanged. It is constantly moving, changing, flowing like water in the direction of somewhere. In the live performance we say time is ephemeral”, she tells us.
Image Courtesy of La Prairie
Excited about the collaboration, La Prairie states: “since the inception of La Prairie, contemporary art, through a plethora of genres, cultures and profiles, has been an elevated prism in which to tell our story. This latest collaboration with Wen-Chi Su, was a natural and authentic one. Not only does she connect intimately with our mission to push the boundaries of science and technology, she also brings through the medium of dance a rich, wholly new perspective to our House. Her mesmerising performance beautifully and simultaneously articulates the science of movement and the concept of time through the prism of the beautiful natural elements found in Switzerland”.