Kongo Cyril Phan (France, 1969) Kongo aka Cyril Phan never imagined that the graffiti he painted on the streets in Paris’ suburbs would be known beyond their frontiers and take him all over the world when he started in 1987. The self-taught French-Vietnamese artist’s visual identity stems from the letter, and now he’s always pushing the limits of words and writing, infusing them with unbridled joie de vivre and optimism.

Today, Kongo leaves his mark on any medium – whether wall, canvas, shop window, trunk, bag, scarf, champagne bottle, car or even airplane – revisiting it in his own way and multiplying collaborations with brands like Hermès, Richard Mille, Daum and La Cornue. On the request of Karl Lagerfeld, he reinterpreted Chane...