Most will hate it. Few will love it. Exactly how we want it.
Most will hate it. Few will love it. Exactly how we want it. This watch is a collaboration between the Raketa Watch Factory (Russia’s main watch factory) and the State Tretyakov Gallery (Russia’s main museum of national art).
This watch is a collaboration between the Raketa Watch Factory (Russia’s main watch factory) and the State Tretyakov Gallery (Russia’s main museum of national art).
We didn’t try to do a beautiful watch. We did a radically abstract watch that doesn’t follow the conventional rules of classic aesthetics. Exactly like the Russian Avant-Garde artist Kazimir Malevich did in 1915 when he painted the most abstract painting in the world: the Black Square.
When asked what was the meaning of his absurd Black Square, Malevich explained that it symbolises a “Big Zero”: the end of the previous period of artistic evolution and the beginning of a radically new artistic reality, free of any kind of association with our physical world, where shapes freely float in an endless white space no longer subject to the rules of gravity. At the beginning most people hated this avant-garde painting. But, with time, it had a groundbreaking influence on modern art and became one of the most iconic paintings in the world.
Most people will not like this watch. But those who are ready to break-up from traditional classic and step into a new aesthetic reality created from Zero will love it. Exactly like the Black Square of Malevich.
The handcrafted dial is made in a mosaic of 3 different stones, a very difficult technique to master: black jade, white jade and violan. The natural “pattern” of each stone reminds the craquelures that appeared over the years on Malevich’s painting. This makes every watch absolutely unique.
The automatic movement is made at the Raketa Watch Factory in Saint-Petersburg. The logotypes of the Tretyakov Gallery and of Raketa are printed on the movement. A Malevich quote is engraved in Russian on the case back of the watch: “… all the phenomena of the world are reduced to a big Zero – or Zero contains all the phenomena of the world.”
The Raketa Big Zero Malevich watch model is released in a limited edition of 300 pieces. It is available on the official online and offline stores of the Raketa Watch Factory and at the official store of the State Tretyakov Gallery.
The cost is Euros 1 208 (no VAT). Part of the proceeds will go to the State Tretyakov Gallery where the “Black Square” painting is exhibited.
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