LVMH-owned Hennessy XO Cognac has partnered with French generative artist Florian Zumbrunn to customise 40 bottles using a robotic arm.
Continuing the brand’s long-standing support for avant-garde artists, the new partnership between Hennessy and Zumbrunn is said to ‘push the boundaries of innovative collaborations’.
The pair has unveiled a collection of 40 numbered pieces featuring a unique and customisable design painted by a robotic arm. The pieces are exclusively available in Cognac, France.
Zumbrunn graduated from Paris’s Les Gobelins visual arts school and is credited with pioneering generative arts. His works have been shown globally in group and solo exhibitions, from London to Miami, Paris to Tokyo.
Generative art uses algorithms pre-written by the artist to autonomously generate new artwork, ideas, shapes, colours and patterns. This unique blend of art and technology expands the possibilities of creative expression and challenges understanding both fields.
Earlier in the year, Zumbrunn travelled to Cognac to draw inspiration from the blending of eaux-de-vie and meet the Hennessy XO team, who used the same recipe created by Maurice Hennessy in 1870.
Zumbrunn explained: “In my work, I am constantly merging multiple disciplines. I blend the old with the new, human gestures with machine output, and traditional techniques such as pastel and watercolour with lines of code. From that perspective, I was particularly inspired by Hennessy’s mastery of the fine art of blending and its continuous dialogue between tradition and innovation.
The artist programmed a series of algorithms to create the 40 decanters. These algorithms produce random compositions from millions of potential variations, influenced by the number of colours and the customer’s selection of a colour palette in the boutique.
Once previewed on a tablet and approved by the customer at the time of purchase, each design is painted under their very eyes by a ‘state-of-the-art’ robotic arm in the boutique onto the ‘second skin’ shell that encases each decanter.
Made entirely from paper pulp, the modern design is an eco-conscious and durable encasement for the Hennessy XO blend. The bottle is finished with a leather label wrapped around the neck of each carafe.
The Hennessy XO Collection by Florian Zumbrunn is available now from the brand’s boutique in Cognac.
Each customisable one-litre bottle is priced at €1,200 (US$1,260) with a 60x100cm fine art matching print signed by the artist. An ordering and shipping service is also available.
Earlier this year, Hennessy teamed up with artist Jean-Michel Othoniel to create Hennessy X.O Masterpiece and Hennessy X.O Limited Edition and partnered with fashion designer Shuting Qiu to release a trio of limited edition Cognac bottles for Chinese New Year 2025.
In November, Moët Hennessy announced that CEO Philippe Schaus would step down in 2025, paving the way for Jean-Jacques Guiony.
In other news from the brand, Hennessy has suspended its plans for a Chinese bottling plant.
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