The Ghanaian visual artist joins the French cognac house as Creative Partner, opening a collaboration across film, design and cultural experiences.
Maison Martell has appointed Prince Gyasi as Creative Partner, bringing his Ghanaian visual perspective to the French cognac house. The collaboration, announced on October 6 according to New Wave Magazine, begins with a film set at Château de Chanteloup, Martell’s historic estate in Cognac. Further work is expected to span film, design and cultural experiences. [1][2]
For Gyasi, the appointment extends a practice already moving between photography, fashion and artistic direction. For Martell, it introduces an artist whose work draws on Accra to present its French heritage.
The opening film gives that relationship a concrete starting point, rather than leaving it as an announcement built around a familiar face.
Prince Gyasi’s vision enters Château de Chanteloup
Gyasi conceived the film, and TJ Sawyerr directed it, according to Hypebeast’s partnership feature. Martell’s own announcement also credits Gyasi as co-director. The setting is the house’s estate in Cognac, not a production location in Ghana, though Accra serves as a central cultural reference. [1][3]
Verge Magazine describes Gyasi moving through the grounds with a golden Ghanaian pushcart as French classical music gives way to Afrobeats. Colour transforms the surroundings into the kind of heightened visual environment associated with his work. The pushcart introduces an everyday Ghanaian object into a setting defined by European luxury. [9]
Speaking in the Hypebeast feature, Gyasi described the project as a conversation between Accra and Cognac, exploring how tradition and contemporary culture can inform each other.
That is his account of the film’s intention, not evidence that the campaign has already produced a particular cultural or commercial outcome. [3]
The artist behind the saturated images
Gyasi’s career began with a comparatively accessible tool. His gallery biography says the self-taught artist, born in Accra in 1995, started photographing at 16 with an iPhone. It describes a practice shaped by community, with subjects including children from Jamestown and images that challenge narrow representations of Africa. [4]
Colour is not simply decoration in that work. Gyasi describes grapheme-colour synaesthesia, in which letters, numbers, days, and names are associated with particular colours.
His photographs combine saturated backgrounds, deliberate compositions, and human subjects, sometimes appearing closer to paintings from a distance.
[3][4]
The smartphone beginning is part of the story, but it should not obscure the work behind the images. Pirelli’s artist profile notes that he later expanded his equipment to include professional cameras. The continuity lies in his visual approach and the people and places informing it, rather than an obligation to keep using the same device. [6]
From Accra’s musicians to fashion and Pirelli
The NATIVE traces an earlier international collaboration to A Great Day in Accra, his project with Apple featuring Ghanaian musicians and the hiplife scene.
The publication also documents his work with Olivier Rousteing for Balmain, including the Fall 2022 interpretation of The Little Prince and photographs appearing in the Fall 2024 menswear collection. [5]
His 2024 Pirelli Calendar, titled Timeless, provided another substantial commission. Pirelli says it was photographed in London and Accra, bringing together figures including Angela Bassett, Naomi Campbell, Idris Elba, Tiwa Savage and Ghanaian artist Amoako Boafo. Otumfuo Osei Tutu II also appears, making Ghanaian heritage part of the project itself. [6][7]
Pirelli describes sets designed around what each subject represented to Gyasi, produced with a team spanning styling, hair and makeup. The calendar illustrates how his authorship can operate within a large collaborative production.
Martell’s appointment follows that experience rather than introducing him to international brand work for the first time. [7]
What the partnership has announced
Martell, founded by Jean Martell in 1715, has more than three centuries of history to draw upon. The announcement presents Gyasi’s film as the start of a broader relationship and says more creative expressions will follow.
New Wave’s coverage identifies film, design, cultural experiences and future house initiatives as the planned scope. [1][2][8]
The title is Creative Partner, not creative director of the entire company. The announcement does not disclose his fee, the contract’s duration or a detailed schedule of future releases. It establishes a creative collaboration, but not ownership of the brand or responsibility for every aspect of its marketing.
Analysis: A Ghanaian perspective within a global commission
The notable feature is the use of Gyasi’s existing artistic language. The film brings Ghanaian references into Martell’s estate rather than treating the artist solely as a product endorser.
That gives viewers a way to assess the partnership through an actual work, including its choices of objects, colour and sound.
For Ghanaian creatives, his career offers a practical example of a locally informed portfolio travelling across different formats. It does not establish a guaranteed route to similar commissions. The relevant work remains visible: sustained image-making, collaborative production and a visual identity that can survive a change of setting.
It also matters to recognize the wider production team. A distinctive artistic vision becomes a finished film through direction, performance, sound, styling and technical work, each deserving clear attribution alongside the headline appointment.
Future releases will show how much room the partnership gives that identity. For now, the confirmed appointment adds another international commission to Gyasi’s career, with Accra remaining part of the creative proposition rather than merely a line in his biography.
