RICHARD HENNESSY – LETTRES IMAGINAIRES
A 300th Anniversary Tribute to Richard Henessy
Event: Laisser au temps…
Place: Hennessy, Quai Maurice Hennessy, 16100 Cognac
Date: September 2024
Graphic design: Olivier Andreotti (Toluca Studio)
Maison Hennessy honors the 300th anniversary of its founder’s birth with a new exhibition « Laisser au temps… » that blends history with art and technology.
From his native Ireland to the Charente region (…), the exhibition offers an immersion in the legacy of its visionary founder, a contemporary of the Age of Enlightenment. An unprecedented journey between cabinet of curiosities, archives, correspondence and artistic creations by the Irishman Michael McGregor.
Catalogue description:
Artistic creations: Michael McGregor
Letters illustrations: Olivier Andreotti
Text: Fabienne Moreau
Softcover
88 pages – 21 x 27 cm
Edition : French and English
September 2024
Graphic design: Olivier Andreotti
« Richard Hennessy was one of those men whose path left glittering traces. By creating his company, rendering prosperous his product, betting on quality and high standards, and leaving behind him a heritage which has been transmitted from generation to generation, he accomplished, as would an author, a work of art in itself. Richard Hennessy is indeed the author of his cognac, the maestro of a creation anchored within a certain unsurpassed idea of luxury and which continues to journey around the world, crossing centuries, renewing itself with each new era, finding new ways of existing in the world, of sharing its taste and qualities, its values too.
Who was he really? A man of his time, open to all which contributed to his era, with a pronounced, and rare, taste for lasting friendships, which he nourished with elegance. A man of networking, before its time. A man who, by exiling himself far from his native country, Ireland, became curious about everything, quick to understand that skill, knowledge, quality of work and relationships with others would be primordial if he were to make a success of his life. A man who believed in the strength and the originality of his product. A visionary, an entrepreneur, he had the necessary lucidity and foresight to settle in Cognac and patiently build a commercial empire, based on the indisputable quality of his eaux-de-vie. But he was also a gentleman with a passion for reading, and a keen interest in emerging authors who thought differently. Those people pleased him. In their works, which he managed to obtain through considerable effort, he found information enabling him to understand the world. He found in them encouragement for his own ideas for building the universe. Instinctively, he applied what he read to his own business. Since, for his business to live he needed to be aware of the hazards of the world, where there was war, or where war was possible or probable and which would hinder the development of his business. Richard Hennessy had an instinct for understanding the forces which disturbed the world, and he used this knowledge to great effect. An enlightened man. »