I attended a wine tasting dinner in downtown Los Angeles last night. It was held in the beautiful loft home of the charming Tarryn Soderberg who owns her own art gallery, Tarryn Teresa Gallery.
Tarryn asked me if I had any involvement in the arts. And I said yes, I sell wine.
She looked at me quizzically for a moment and then seemed to understand my meaning.
Wine is art to me and the winemakers are artists. Some bottles are like a cheap velvet Elvis and some are like the Mona Lisa, and the great ones for me are like Frida Kahlo on a sad but defiant day.
Below is the story of another wine professional who celebrates the connection between art and wine.
Brigitte and Philippe Armenier are the former owners of Domaine de Marcoux in Chateauneuf-du-Pape, which they converted to Biodynamics in 1989.
They both moved to California in 2001 and have acted as Biodynamics consultants to many U.S. wineries including:
Demeter certified: Beckmen / Bergstrom / Cayuse Vyds / Grgich Hills / Montinore / Sawyer-lindquist / Sycamore Vyds;
Total or partial Biodynamics: L'Aventure / Beacon Hill / Beaux-Freres / Black Family Vyds / Brooks / Cain Vyds / Demetria / DuMol / Ehlers / Freestone Vyds / Grace Family / Halter Ranch Vyds / Hartford Vyds / Hedges Estate / Holloran / Justin / Oakville East / Joseph Phelps Vyds - Insignia / Resonance / SeaSmoke / Solena / Sullivan / Unti / White Cottage Ranch / Wilridge...
Brigitte is also a musician and has recently released her new CD,Analogos, in which she plays Schubert and Brahms. She believes "Biodynamics is music applied to the realm of agriculture".
There is a lengthy interview attached to the CD where Brigitte explains her philosophy on music and biodynamics.
"Biodynamic agriculture emphasizes the importance of the natural environment, meaning not only Earth but also cosmos. Chemical-free, it stresses the conscious observation of and work with the rhythms and evolutionary forces of the living. Through its practices and particularly from its specific preparations made from natural substances, Biodynamic farming revitalizes the soils, enlivens all their processes of fertility and as a result, enables the full expression of their uniqueness in a sort of “melody of the terroir.”
What is your connection between art and wine?
6 comments:
The connection of art and wine is real indeed, and should not get lost in the constant chase for ratings and reviews. For me, Hess Collection and Clos Pegase (both with extensive art collections at the winery) are two places I always recommend people visit. Ditto DiRosa Preserve in Carneros (they don't make wine but adjacent to Winery Lake vyds. Have you ever had Sean Thackrey's wines? He is, as I last recall, both an art dealer (based in Bay area) and winemaker.
Nice specifics, thank you. I will check out Sean's site now.
The connection to wine and art for me is easy- Beauty, emotion, and the ability to captivate.
You are certainly in the art business!
Dear Amy: art and wine?… As a musician, I can only relate the essence of art to the act of composition which finds a polar resonance in the creative act of farming, or “the art of bringing culture to nature”: both gestures require a vision of the future supported by a strong will. As for the experience of the living sound, I would taste its flowing heaviness and breathing in the present time-dimension of the grape juice. While the recording of a CD or the making of a wine connect us to preservation processes that engage the memory. Emotions will thus arise from each of these three steps but maybe what is interesting is the fact that, in a living time-sequence, their origin of movement and direction differs. Allowing us to experience music and agriculture, living sound and grape juice, CD and wine, as qualitative exercises in the study of consciousness. Kind regards, Brigitte
Yes, the creation process. Making something beautiful and meaningful from the raw elements at your disposal, be they chords or grapes.
The forethought to integrate these disparate pieces into a beautiful whole.
As the descriptions and comparisons grow broader and therefore more squishy then all human activity that involves creativity, which is almost all the challenges we face navigating our work and home life, can be characterized as artistic endeavors. Can we do a bit more narrowing...?
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