Fashion meets art in Tiffany's blue box

FOR over 15 years, Daniel Arsham's sculptures and installations have captivated much of the art and fashion world. The 41-year-old New York artist typically takes familiar objects and casts them in geological materials such as metal, ash and crystal. He then "ages" the objects so that they look like they have existed for hundreds of years and only recently been dug out from the ground.

Take, for instance, his latest collaboration with Tiffany & Co. The brand is famous for its sophisticated jewellery that is always gifted in the unmistakable Tiffany blue box crowned with a white ribbon.

Arsham has taken that box and reimagined it as a series of 49 exquisitely eroded bronze sculptures that appear simultaneously ancient and futuristic. Like many of Arsham's sculptures, these boxes have cracks and crevices, within which beautiful small crystals sprout like mineralogical phenomena. The hand-finished patina lends the illusion of the boxes being antique and, at the same time, honours both Tiffany's proprietary blue and the Arsham studio colour.

Within the box, however, is a beautifully elegant limited-edition Tiffany x Arsham Studio Knot bracelet in 18k white gold with diamonds and tsavorites - a gleaming contrast to the distressed box. (Tsavorite, a Tiffany legacy gemstone introduced to the world in 1974, is another nod to Tiffany's and Arsham Studio's signature colours.)

Future trophies

Speaking on Zoom from New York, Arsham says: "Tiffany's represents different things to different people around the world. But here in the US, it is a brand that many generations of American women are familiar with. Our wives, mothers and grandmothers know the brand. And the Tiffany box has become as iconic as any of the jewellery inside it."

Explaining his artistic process, he says: "When I embarked on this project - as I do with other projects in my 'Future Archeological' series - I was looking for something that's immediately recognisable and iconic, something that I could project into the future and imagine what it might look like 1,000 or 10,000 years from now. The Tiffany box is perfect because it represents all of those qualities. "

Arsham's sculptures blur the past, present and future: "These boxes offer a glimpse of the future in the present. They have this kind of archaeological quality to them, a conflict that needs to be resolved. And this kind of conflict is where the work really lives."

Arsham is one of the most sought-after contemporary artists in the world today. His career began to rise rapidly in 2005 when he was chosen by the dance company of the late avant-garde choreographer Merce Cunningham to design its sets.

Soon after, Arsham co-founded the hip architectural firm Snarkitecture with Alex Mustonen and embarked on several collaborations with top fashion houses, interior design labels and other creative powerhouses.

Arsham also has a knack for impressing celebrities: Pharrell Williams, James Franco, Hajime Sorayama and Jay-Z count among his friends and collaborators.

Arsham's growing market

According to the data on art site Artsy, the number of users inquiring about works by Arsham on the platform has been steadily rising over the past five years, increasing more than elevenfold from 2016 to 2020. In 2020, he was the 13th most in-demand artist on Artsy.

Among his many achievements, it is his "Future Archeological" series that has made him a superstar, as global collectors clamour for his "aged" sculptures of iconic objects such as Pokemon toys and Game Boy consoles.

Asked for his own theory of their appeal, Arsham says: "I think the notion of being able to step outside of your own lifespan is something fascinating. We all have a fascination with history that is revealed to us in reverse. We are all looking back.

"But could we project forward? Could we imagine what the archaeological relics of the future will be? To me, these archeological relics will be the objects that surround us everyday now. Many of these objects are those produced by brands . . . So thinking about these objects as markers of some potential future archaeology is really a compelling idea for a lot of people."

He describes the Tiffany box as a "fixture" in our culture that will "continue to be relevant decades, even centuries from now".

With the box now rendered as non-perishable bronze sculptures by a top-notch artist, its legacy is further cemented.