Evian water, filtered through glacial rocks in the town Évian-les-Bain in the French Alps, was discovered in 1789, and 37 years later, in 1826, it was first bottled by the King of Piedmont-Sardinia.
The ubiquitous and bougie water brand is now celebrating its 200th anniversary by collaborating with a cohort of athletes (tennis stars Carlos Alcaraz, Emma Raducanu, and Francis Tiafoe, and golfer Céline Boutier) and the artist Jeff Koons.
Koons’s limited-edition clear glass bottles are for both still and sparkling water. The still bottle has a pink top and an image of one of the artist’s iconic, stainless-steel pink balloon dog; the sparkling one features the same design but in blue. Both are wrapped in a silver ribbon.
Jeff Koons with his limited-edition Evian bottles.
Courtesy Evian
Koons’s 12-foot-tall balloon dog sculptures are perhaps his most recognizable artworks. They first appeared in the mid-1990s, as part of the artist’s now-notorious “Celebration” series. Many versions of these exist, in a variety of colors (pink and blue, like on the Evian bottles, plus yellow, orange, and red). In 2013, an orange version sold for $58.4 million at Christie’s, at the time a record for the most expensive work by a living artist.
Evian has collaborated with cultural figures since 2007, mostly fashion designers like Christian Lacroix, Diane von Furstenberg, Alexander Wang, and Balmain. In 2019, Virgil Abloh designed an Evian bottle; mostly known in the fashion world, his show “Figures of Speech” opened at the MCA Chicago in the summer of 2019 before a long tour. Koons appears to be the the first visual artist to partner with the brand.
“I chose to incorporate my iconic Balloon Dog in the design because it not only resonates with the brand’s own iconic status,” Koons said in a statement, “but is also directly related to this celebratory, optimistic—and I believe life-giving—moment.”
