Story of Spiral 85 l.e.
Inspiration
TIME ... WHAT IS THE TIME?
Time is a permanent
unfolding event. Time is a "time in a space" - the value
indicating individual, consecutive measurement units. At first, in our common
understanding of time, idea appears to be a linear one, but, in the expanding
Universe is reflected in all directions. This phenomenon was expressed in the
past by Chinese character Yin - Yang,
whose round shapes pervading any existing movement of any physically conditioned space.
This
fact became the inspiration and our main intention - to evoke , that time as an
event in a space in general, could be displayed even on so tiny area, such as
wristwatch dial.
Story of the Spiral Watch is closely linked with the introduction of our Frantisek Kupka Salon d'Automne Paris 1912 watch (12pc limited series). This new idea unfold after their first public presentation in December 2012, then shortly after that Jan Prokop and world respected architect, sculptor and glass artist Vaclav Cigler (86)met.
"It was right from the very first moment, when we came together, where Cigler revealed his idea about mutual combination of watch and art together, which was very different from our own idea.
He did not question our inspiration by Frantisek Kupka painting in our first watch, nor its mechanical and graphic design.
True to his life time philosophical insight into all of his work Cigler suggested, that his approach in this new artistic intent, will rather go direction supported by basic time philosophy, than just purposeful adaptation of watch mechanism or dial."
From the moment Václav Cigler sketched his initial idea was the turn for Jan Prokop and Petr Kubik. They immediately rushed to work to try solve Cigler's idea. How entirely philosophical concept of time put into reality. Very soon, the solution came into unusual arrangement, under which the classical watch hands could not be used the traditional way, but rather the whole dial will move in a period of 24 hours, powered by PB11 HS calibre. It is a half skeleton version of the basic PB10 caliber, modified to run in a 24-hour cycle. That was one of the basic conditions of functioning of the entire system - emphasize the dual principle of the day and the night, the light and the shadow, good and evil, or the general life dual principles.
Support the whole Spiral watch idea was to highlight, where to read actual time on the dial. Just as the sun rises in the East and during the day travel above our head, it was necessary to use the similar conditions on this watch.
To achieve this, the lower half of the dial is covered by unique galvanized glass sandwich inclined at an angle of 51 ° towards the sixth hour mark. Result achieved was a partially transparent effect of window blinds. When viewed perpendicular to the dial the lower half of semitransparent glass evokes the Earth element and in the same time the upper clear part of the glass evokes the element of the Air.
If the watch owner wants to admire the harmony of Yin-Yang symbol only and enjoy the philosophical dimension of this watch, then it is enough just to take a quick look at the watch.
In this case, subconsciously, we do not look at the watch the way we would like to read the time. Under this angle glass sandwiches enables us to see the dial almost clear quality.
The light games themselves and the reflections of those individual galvanized glass pieces , along with their partial transparency are giving to this Spiral watch their artistic dimension.
Indeed, the entire Spiral watch was created as an artistic object, that offers a harmony of contemporary technology with the physics and the philosophical and spiritual overlap.
For example, the angle of the sandwiched galvanized glass pieces was not used just randomly.
51 degree angle was chosen, because, under this angle, the second reflection of the light beam can be seen in the raindrop.
Therefore, this angle was in ancient Egypt, taken as magical one.
From the technical and technological point of view, to make this sandwiched and galvanized glass is the most difficult part of the Spiral watch production.
Standard watch glass is formed usually from a sapphire mono block.
In the case of this watch, however, is made out of twenty glass components, galvanized and glued together in vacuo, with use of the special glue with the same refractive index as that of normal clear glass, so that a thin layer of adhesive will not distort usual glass clarity.
With the implementation of galvanized sandwiches significantly helped another master of Czech glassmaking - Mr. Jan Frydrych, an artist, whose glass objects can be seen in the most prestigious international exhibitions and collections all around the world.
Exact time is visible thru the double line galvanized on the glass.
Exact minutes can be read using the "shuttle" moving circumferentially around the dial, though even here, we can't see a classical minute hand.
Medallions of key participiants
Václav Cigler
Mr. Cigler was born on 21 April 1929 in Vsetin and was a student at the Masaryk grammar school from 1940 to 1948. After graduating from the industrial glass school in Novy Bor (1948-1951), he was a student of Profesor J. Kaplicky (1951-1957) at the Academy VSUP. From 1965 until 1979 he was director at the studio “Glass in Architecture” at the University of Fine Arts in Bratislava.
Mr. Cigler significantly influenced the characteristics and development of glass in the Czech and the Slovak Republic. In his work he focuses on objects created from polished, optical glass; designing of illumination and jewelry; spatial objects; and compositions for architecture. Today, he is one of the most important, living artists worldwide.
Petr Kubik
Petr Kubik is a product and industrial designer who since childhood has been interested in creative work. The first time when he significantly came a step closer to his future career was at the Architecture Faculty where he studied architecture of buildings. During his studies he realized that he would like to develop another side of his creativity. He longed for a complex implementation of specific products, and therefore industrial design has become a logical step in his further career. Petr Kubik has always considered the very beginning of product development to be the most interesting and exciting phase of the creative process. Thus, he left the Architecture College and continued at the Faculty for Mechanical Engineering in Industrial Design. There he finally began to fulfill his childhood dreams, and it did not take long time until he began collecting awards at different contests. The most significant awards were the one for a design a mobile internet device for the company Intel, and the one at the international contest Roca for the concept of a bathtub with variable volume. Quite logically this also launched his professional career as a freelancer in which he had already many successes as well, including the conception of the the project for the design of keys for the car manufacturer Volvo and of the bath series MewMio for the company Laufen / Roca / Jika.
Special thanks
Jan Frydrych, Jan Procházka, Tomáš Fejt, Libor Dlabač