Zadig & Voltaire Face Artist Plagiarism Charges for Paris Fashion Week

Zadig & Voltaire represent a high fashion brand. The brand designed a promotion video for Women’s Fall-Winter 2023 show, for the Paris Fashion Week. The video features a fountain and flames.  But, the video may not be an original creation of the brand, that is why there are accusations of plagiarism.

The brand’s video featuring a flaming fountain is very similar to Julian Charrière’s work. Social media users recognized it too. Zadig & Voltaire posted the video on the brand’s Instagram account on January 19. In the video, orange flames that burn through the background are lit up in a fountain’s three rings.

Julian Charrière is French-Swiss artist who created a similar video in 2019. And Beneath It All Flows Liquid Fire is the name of Charrière’s video creation. His video consists of three-step fountain, fire and black background which highlights them. His work circulated over many international venues.

Those locations, for example, are France, Switzerland, and New York. Another place in America where you could see Charrière’s creation is Art Basel Miami Beach. But, the similarity between this video and Zadig & Voltaire’s is undeniable. Both of them have a crackling fire’s sound.

Zadig & Voltaire Deleted Post Comments That Mentioned Julian Charrière

Julian Charrière reached out and spoke about Zadig & Voltaire’s Fashion Week promo video. He stated the brand never got in touch with him and asked for a permission to use his work. “I only discovered this campaign a few days ago, when people reached out to me about it and started tagging me”, he said in his Instagram statement.

He also noted Zadig & Voltaire deleted every comment mentioning his name under their posts and reels. Because of that, he decided to post online his video, created in 2019. His video is well recognized and has more than 2,000 likes. Also, art professionals started sharing his video, such as Olafur Eliasson.

Zadig & Voltaire never gave any official comment connected to the accusations against them, except of them deleting the comments connected to Julian Charrière. The brand had their runway show at Poush, on Friday. Push is a trendy studio dedicated to emerging artists.