Tribute to Jean-Jacques Rousseau

This year we celebrate the tricentennial of his birth. Vacheron Constantin – almost a contemporary of Rousseau as it was founded in 1755 – has chosen to mark the event with several important acts of cultural patronage. For example, the Manufacture is a benefactor to JJR (Citoyen de Genève), a contemporary lyrical opera written for the Grand Théâtre de Genève.

It is exceptionally rare in this day and age for a lyrical opera to be commissioned. Vacheron Constantin, which is accustomed to maintaining ties with some of the most demanding customers in the world, was naturally enthused by this challenge. The opera had its world première on September 11th, in the evocative surroundings of the Bâtiment des Forces Motrices in Geneva.

Vacheron Constantin is also supporting Christophe Chevalier’s film Le Nez dans le Ruisseau, as well as La Faute à Rousseau, a series of sixty short films by Swiss and international directors.

No one better than a Fine Watch Manufacture knows the sum of patience and care it takes to work on mechanisms, complications and gears with the same attention as the philosopher concentrated on defining and perfecting his thoughts. And no one better than a Fine Watch customer knows just how sweet, to borrow Rousseau’s words, the fruit of this patience is when he slips an exceptional timepiece onto his wrist. “If I am not better, at least I am different”, the philosopher wrote. In my most humble opinion, in this three-hundredth anniversary year we can take a timely reminder that it is a duty to be different and a joy to be best.

Or at least to try by investing in work, research and culture.