Have you ever wondered what a watch would look like if it were an inflatable? No sharp lines, just round bubble-like features? Well, no need to use your imagination any more as Hublot and Jeff Koons have joined forces to create exactly that, in the form of the new Classic Fusion Balloon Dog. Together, the watchmaker and artist have taken the air-filled and mirror-polished look of Koons’ famous inflatable ‘Balloon Dog’ sculpture and turned it into an innovative and playful timepiece.
The partnership between Koons, one of the world’s most widely recognised contemporary artists, and world-renowned Swiss watchmaking brand Hublot comes down to a shared drive for imagination and bold expression. Both the artist and watchmaker are known for taking the ordinary and turning it into something incredible: Koons with supersized balloon sculptures; and Hublot, which burst onto the horological scene in 1980 by daring to pair gold watch cases with rubber straps.
Hublot has partnered with several contemporary artists to date. Most notably with Takashi Murakami, who created a rainbow-hued and gem-set design with the artist’s smiling flower motif; and with Daniel Arsham on pocket- and wristwatch designs inspired by the fluidity of water. For Hublot, which is guided by an integral philosophy it dubs the Art of Fusion, time itself is treated as a material, something to be shaped so a fleeting moment can be made to last.
Jeff Koons has built his career on a similar premise. In 1994, he introduced his first inflatable Balloon Dog sculpture as part of his ‘Celebration’ series. The artist transformed objects associated with childhood into giant colourful sculptures, to commemorate ephemeral experiences and turn them into something enduring. In 2013, an orange ‘Balloon Dog’ sculpture broke records when it sold at Christie’s auction house, becoming one of the most expensive pieces by a living artist.
Despite the fact that his sculptures focus on simple everyday objects, the creation process is anything but. Each ‘Balloon Dog’ sculpture requires 45 artisans and thousands of hours to ensure there isn’t a single blemish. The process begins with a small-scale model scanned digitally to create renderings that mark each curve of the sculpture.
Then, pieces of mirror-polished stainless steel are cut into individual fragments using lasers before they are welded together, sanded, buffed and polished. The sculpture is given a transparent coating last, to achieve its saturated colour whilst still revealing the metal beneath it. It’s a process built around one material and one goal: to make rigid stainless steel appear as soft as air.
A defining factor of the Classic Fusion Balloon Dog, and perhaps what makes its design so effective, is the extensive commitment to re-creating elements of the original sculpture as closely as possible. For instance, to evoke the air-filled, “puffy” look, Hublot reshaped and domed the dial, case and even the padded metallic leather strap.
Elements of the ‘Balloon Dog’ sculpture are woven into the design to add a playful touch: a crown shaped like a balloon’s knot, a bendable rubber dog tail decor on the left upper corner, a seconds hand with a counterweight fashioned like the sculpture, and ‘inflated’ indexes and hands. The watch comes in three colourways that match Koons’ famous sculptures: silver, in mirror-polished stainless steel; and blue and red anodised aluminium—each variant limited to 200 pieces.
This playful collaboration between Hublot and Jeff Koons comes at a time when the topic of ‘play’ has become more current than ever. From Rimowa’s collaboration with Pokémon to Mattel and Nadine Ghosn’s line of Polly Pocket jewellery—and now the Classic Fusion Balloon Dog by Hublot and Koons—one is reminded that the inner child always finds a way to play.
