March, 2020 - Of Art and Wine

The Great Vedutisti of Venice and Pinot Grigio Venezia.

Entrance to the Grand Canal, Venice, by Canaletto, 1730. Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX.
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Well, we have all seen them on any trip to a fine arts museum. You know, THEM, those romantic scenes of the Venice of by gone times, full of gondolas maneuvering their way along the canals. Yes, by-gone times, the 1700s to be precise, where the largest boats were fishing vessels not gigantic cruise liners carrying 5,000 passengers. Ah, those were the days. They certainly were for Giovanni Antonio Canal, known to us as Canaletto (1697-1768). Somewhere around 1726 as the British Grand Tour became all the rage, Venice was one of the favorite places to stop. Its beauty was something these tourists wanted to remember, hence a sudden market for beautifully painted scenes of the city, known as vedute. Canaletto made a fortuitous connection with the British ambassador, Joseph Smith, who not only bought the young painter’s work but talked it up to all those wealthy British travelers. Canaletto was amenable to moving his painting style more toward the tastes of those refined Brits and their ideas of British Rationalism. His superb skills in composition were put to good use, as was his camera obscura (see information below), as he moved his painting toward the pristine, clearly defined, and romanticized scenes his patrons loved to proudly display as they bragged about their grand voyage.

Canaletto had a great sense of drama, as he grew up originally following in his father’s footsteps as a painter of stage scenery. While he used that fine sense of composition in his vedute that so pleased his English clients, one can see by his early painting that the sense of drama was quite present in his work. The painting below has much more of it than his later vedute, which tend toward a perfected clarity and luminousity that can seem a bit static. In the painting below we see movement in the clouds and the darkened skies which tell the viewer that not every day in Venice is a sunny one. Canaletto, however, did find an outlet for his dramatic flair, which will be looked at later.

San Cristoforo, San Michele, and Murano from the Fondamenta Nuove by Canaletto, 1722 Dallas Museum of Art, collections.dma.org

The idea of painting lovely scenes of Venice had gotten started before the British tourist boom. One of the first vedutisti, as the painters of these scenes were called, was Gaspar van Wittel. He was a native of a town in the far north of Europe near Ultrecht where the climate was quite a bit different than that of Venice. He arrived in Venice around 1695 and started painting iconic scenes of the city around 1697. Luca Carlevarijs published in 1703 a book of prints of 103 scenic views of Venice, which became a sort of guide for other painters of scenes. He also did oil paintings of these views and was active when Canaletto began his career as a vedutista.

And there were other rivals to Canaletto, like Michele Marieschi and Bernardo Bellotto, but his primary rival was a man who came from a family of not well-known painters, Francesco Guardi. Guardi and his brother Gian Antonio picked up what work they could. Not much of what they produced together was remarkable, and in fact Guardi had a hard life financially right up to his death in 1793. However, after his brother’s death in 1760, Guardi began to enter the field of painting vedute. When Canaletto died in 1768, there was more room for Guardi who began turning out his own brand of Venetian views. In his painting below, the skies are less formulaic and more natural to the changing moods of Venetian weather than the standard Canaletto. While there is traffic on the canal, it is not the flurry of every kind of vessel we see in Canaletto’s view. Rather we see gondolas peacefully ferrying people about on the placid surface of the canal. The buildings are not as starkly detailed, and the whole piece has a softer feeling to it.

The Grand Canal with the churches San Simeone and Santa Lucia by Francesco Guardi c. 1780 Philadelphia Museum of Art philamuseum.org

Guardi was not opposed to showing the gloomier side of Venice’s waters and mists. In The Gondola on the Lagoon (1765-70), we see a Venice that is far in the distance, shrouded in the beige/gray mists of a sky that is only distinquished from the sea by the strip of whitish buildings that is the city. The gondola in the foreground seems to be heading off to somewhere other than Venice, as if moving into the unknown. This painting has a great mystery about it, and some speculate that Guardi was still mourning the death of the older brother who had raised him from the age of five after their father died. Gian Antonio, the brother, had also taught Francesco to paint; however, it was after Gian Antonio’s death when Francesco’s painting began to really develop. The painting below is certainly not the usual veduta, but it shows a deep sensitivity and an awareness of space relationships and color in creating a mood.

The Gondola on the Lagoon by Francesco Guardi, 1765-1770 (wikiart.org)

The Capriccios (Caprices)

While the majority of the tourist market for vedute was for the classic scenes of Venice and its Grand Canal, the artists as always found ways to let their creative energies exhibit themselves. In 18th century Venice that came about with the Capriccios, or fantasy paintings of a ruined city still fully populated with people and what were supposed to be once famous landmarks. Here the artists let their minds roam free to create these imagined scenes full of arches and columns that stood alone after whatever building they’d been a part of had collapsed. Weeds grow out of the cracks and across the tops of these structures. The humans who inhabit the buildings of these fantasy-scapes seem always to be preoccupied with whatever their daily needs and duties are while living calmly among the ruins. Below a Canaletto, Caprice with Ruins, 1742, Guardi’s Caprice (1732), and Bernardo Bellotto’s Caprice with a House on the Lagoon, c. 1745.

Canaletto Caprice with Ruins, 1742; Guardi Caprice, c.1778; Bernardo Bellotto Caprice House on the Lagoon, c. 1745.

The Magic Camera (Obscura)

One question that always comes up is this: How did they get so much precision when doing those complicated pieces of architecture? Well, as they say, it is all done with mirrors. The camera obscura used a lens and a slanted mirror pointed at the scene that one wished to replicate. The lens and mirror were mounted inside a box. The box sat above a structure with heavy dark cloth around it to block out light. The whole thing sat on a table where the artist could sit and draw the outlines of the projected image on the canvas. The pictures below come from a lovely little book, Venise au temps de Canaletto, which was published in 2012 to go with the Canaletto Guardi les deux maitres de Venise (Two Masters of Venice) exposition in Paris.

To find out more about how the camera obscura works, look at this video, The Art of Photography – the Camera Obscura, youtube.com.

Finally, we shall leave Venice with its current wonder – clear water in the canals! Yes, with the fight against COVID-19, the lack of traffic on the waterways of the city has allowed the dolphins to return. Viva Venezia!

A little lesson in Italian: Veduta is one painting of Venice; vedute is more than one. Vedutista is a painter of Venetian scenes; vedustisti are painters of Venetian scenes.

Paintings are in public domain but links are given to their museum locations. The three caprices are photos taken by me from the catalog Canaletto Guardi, les deux maitres de Venise, 2012 and used in accordance with Fair Use policy.

Marjorie Vernelle is an artist, writer, college professor, and traveler. For more see the Pages at ofartandwine.com or her author page at amazon.com and her art at Vernelle Art Boutique vernellestudio.com.

Pinon Grigio Venezia

Sommelier pours pinot grigio wine in glasses for degustation (iStockphotos)

In Venice one way to escape the hustle and bustle in a city always busy with commerce, whether shipping or tourism, is to stop at a favorite cafe for a small snack and a refreshing glass of one of Venice’s favorite wines, a Pinot Grigio Venezia DOC. (DOC means the wine is certified to originate in the Veneto.) Add a bit of conversation with the barman, the restaurant owner, or a friend who happens to be passing by, and you have a nice respite from the stresses of daily life.

Pinot Grigio first arrived in the Veneto in the early 19th century and hailed from France and Germany. The grape is a genetic variation on the Pinot Noir grape which produces one of the most drinkable wines, lauded in both text and film (Sideways, 2004). In France it is known as Pinot Gris, but apart from the differences in soil, Pinot Gris and Pinot Grigio are rather the French and Italian versions of the same thing.

Pinot Grigio Venezia tends to be a golden yellow, though it can come in forms that are very, very pale. It can have hints of pineapple and pear William and a slight floral aroma. Like springtime, it is a young wine, fresh and meant to be drunk and not aged (though under certain conditions it can be aged some). Pinot Grigio does differentiate itself from the French Pinot Gris by being drier in taste, with a touch of the mineral. The French version tends to be fruitier. Another version of wine from the same grape comes from Alsace and is quite sweet. For a “deep dive,” as Madeline Puckette of Wine Folly says, go to “The 3 Types of Pinot Grigio” winefolly.com. If you want a short video of an actual tasting of a good Pinot Grigio, click on this video from Santavinea youtube.com.

Food, Glorious Food…

Just the basics: Cooked Shrimp Photo credit Maria Labada from unsplash.com

As we know, Venice sits on the water, its buildings resting on a forest of enormous wooden pilings driven into the ground below the surface of the sea. The sea surrounds it and runs through it, so what kind of foods might one eat with a Pinot Grigio Venezia? Seafood! Right! But that is not all. It goes marvelously with a basic, like a good slice of bread and some raw ham. In fact various meat dishes, from roast pork to fried chicken, can be had with a nice glass of Pinot Grigio. To get the low down on some of the wonderful possibilities see “12 Recipes that Go Gaga for Pinot Grigio” by Carl Hansen on allrecipes.com

Finally should you want a 3.5 minute virtual vacation, I send you to Oliver Astrologo’s video on Venice. youtube.com

Should you want to taste wines from around the world, try Cellars Wine Club’s International Wine Club. You can click this link cellarswineclub.com or investigate by looking at the Cellars Wine Club page in the righthand column on this page.

Photos of food and wine are from free photo sites or live-linked to web sources.

Of Art and Wine affiliates with Bluehost.com and CellarsWineClub.com and may earn from qualifying purchases.

©marjorie vernelle 2020

Coming Soon on Of Art and Wine: Carel Fabritius’ Goldfinch and Netherlands Wines.

This little painting of a lonely, little bird chained to its perch is a small masterpiece by Carel Fabritius done in 1654. Some of its current fame comes from Donna Tartt’s novel by the same name, a wonderful read by the way. However, one real mystery surrounding the painting is about whether Fabritius taught Vermeer, making him the link in art history between Rembrandt and Vermeer. Here, on Of Art and Wine, of course, we add an additional element of surprise – Netherlands Wine!

Picasso, Matisse, and Tibouren (Antibois) Wine.

Guitar by Pablo Picasso, 1912 and Dance by Henri Matisse, 1909-1910

Here we have works by two of the 20th century’s greatest artists, and as in their friendship (and rivalry), the works play off of one another, with perhaps Matisse’s dance being done to the music of Picasso’s guitar. Henri Matisse (1869-1954) is the most prominent of the adherents of a short-lived movement called Fauvism (c. 1903-1908). The word comes from the French, fauve, meaning wild beast. Now what was so wild about Fauvism? Well, just think back to the painting of the 19th century. Often it consisted of very well formulated representational work. Even the Impressionists did paintings where one could still see recognizable realistic images of people and landscapes. The Fauves did not adhere to that. They used colors that had no relationship to the objects they painted; their work often looked flat and without much dimension; and they painted the moods and emotions of the artist rather than an external image. Wild!

Woman with a Hat (Mme. Matisse 1905) came as quite a shock to the established ideas of what a painting was supposed to look like. Though Van Gogh and Gaugain had already started the process, Matisse took it to the next level. While the works of the Fauves set the Paris art world on its heels, there were some very smart American art collectors interested in this work, especially the work of Matisse. They were the Steins: Michael, Leo, and Gertrude.

It was Gertrude Stein who introduced Matisse, a conservative man born into a bourgeois family who were in the flower trade, to Pablo Picasso (1881-1973), a younger painter from Malaga, Spain, who was, in words written later by Françoise Gilot, “A foreigner, who benefited from a romantic aura that transformed his irrational and erratic declarations into seducing enigmas.” Matisse, who gathered other artists about him for intellectual discussions on art, was also known to keep his bourgeois distance from the more bohemian art set that went to the same café, Le Dome, in Montparnasse. He would sit in the café “…with a vague and distant look, lost in his thoughts, with a severe and distant demeanor: a real sphinx” (Gilot). Stein introduced the two artists to see what fireworks might happen.

Well, it can’t be said that there were never fireworks. Matisse was particularly upset when Picasso lured André Derain and Georges Braque away from the Fauves to a new movement of which Picasso was the leading adherent, Cubism. The Guitar shown above is an example of one of Picasso’s early cubist paintings. However, that did not stop Matisse from recommending that one of his collectors, Russian businessman Sergei Shchukin, look also at Picasso’s work. Shchukin over the years would come to purchase 50 works by Picasso, while continuing to collect Matisse as well.

Polar Opposites

From the way they spoke, Matisse’s speech being described as a precise, well-pronounced stream of words with the flow of an indolent river, and Picasso’s speech being a French that was far from “au courant” (up to speed or commonly understood), right down to the way they worked, the two artists were polar opposites. Matisse’s studio was filled with objects of interest that could be used in his paintings. Though he knew the structure of the female body well, he still used live models. As for Picasso, while he does have portraits of the women he loved and others like the young French model, Sylvette (see Picasso’s Muse Sylvette, youtube.com), most of his work came from images in his head. His chairs, guitars, pots, fruits, females, etc. were all from memory and imagination.

Odalisque by Henri Matiss, 1923 Expressionist style painting.

Les Demoiselles d’Avignon by Pablo Picasso, 1907

In looking at these two examples, it is clear to see how Matisse dealt with the female form to capture the mood of this woman, unconcious while she naps, surrounding her with lush colors, perhaps reminiscent of the flowers his family traded in. Picasso’s demoiselles, who perhaps not so oddly all look like him, are presented almost as specters of a somewhat demented dream. Their styles of painting differed as well. Matisse washed down the painting he had done at the end of the day, only to begin again the next day with a more refined version. Picasso simply overpainted his canvases until he arrived at what he finally wanted, leaving sometimes as many as thirty versions of the painting in layers underneath the final version. (Gilot)

Neither of the artists left France during World War II. Matisse moved about Nice, from near the sea on the Cours Saleya (in the yellow building at the far eastern end) to the pristine elegance of the Regina, an superb former hotel where Queen Victoria had stayed high up in the hills of Cimiez, and then to Vence. Picasso stayed self-sequestered in his studio in Paris, where he painted alone but in the socially distant company of several paintings by Matisse. Picasso, in fact, purchased at least 10 Matisse paintings during his lifetime. Matisse never purchased a Picasso, though the painters sometimes traded paintings.

When Matisse died, Picasso did a series of Odalisque paintings perhaps in tribute to his long-time friend (and friendly rival). Some say that Matisse, who was always generous to Picasso, was a type of father-figure. Picasso at times certainly acted like a rebellious son. Yet each knew to look seriously at the work of the other to contemplate and understand it. Even though criticisms would be made, it was a valuable dialogue between these greats who contributed so much to how we see art now. Both are, of course, now gone, so only their work remains to talk to us. However, as always, the river of art flows on, so we will see what comes up around the next bend.

Francoise Gilot’s wonderful book Matisse and Picasso, a Friendship in Art, was first published in the U.S. in 1990. She was the artist-companion of Picasso when he moved to the south of France and bore him two children. The version I have is in French, and the translations above are my own.

The art works discussed are in public domain in the U.S.

Marjorie Vernelle is an artist, writer, college professor, and traveler. For more see the Pages at ofartandwine.comor her author page at amazon.com and her art at Vernelle Art Boutique vernellestudio.com.

A Tricky Grape named for Antibes but best known as Tibouren.

A montage of images from Clos Cibonne, a premier vintner of Tibouren rosé. Photos from demaisondeselections.com

So where are we exactly when we talk about Côtes de Provence. Well, it is in southeastern France along the Mediterranean coast. It starts roughly near Marseilles and extends east through the Var and into the Maritime Alps. While the region produces both red and white wines, its speciality is rosé, in particular some of the palest pink wines anywhere.

However, a full-bodied rosé is produced there as well, and the grape that produces it bears a name that refers to the lovely seaside town I once lived in, Antibes. The grape is a dark grape with a black skin that may have originally come from the middle east via the Greeks who first settled the coast of Provence along what is now the French Riviera. They founded the cities of Marseille (Massilia), Nice (Nikea) and Antibes (Antipolis). The grape often called Tibouren is also known as Antibois, which means “from Antibes.” And as always there is a bit of local rivalry involved between Nice (Nikea, the larger city the Greeks founded) and its smaller counterpart across the Bay of Angels, Antibes (Antipolis, meaning the other city). This rivalry comes in the form of another name for wine made from this Antibois grape, which is Bianco di Nizza (White Wine of Nice).

Local rivalries aside, there is not a great quantity of this grape grown or wine produced because of certain difficulties caused by the local spring weather. Spring on the Côte d’Azur can be tricky, sometimes cold and rainy or the opposite, high out-of-season temperatures. This seasonal variance can cause the vines not to pollinate or to “shatter,” hence no grapes. (The French word for this misfortune is coulure.)

When things go well, the bunches may be irregular in shape with grapes ranging in color from dark purple to light pink. The wine has the taste of herbs and is quite aromatic, though rather dry. In terms of food pairings, well, my favorite is magret de canard a l’orange (duck breast with orange sauce) along with a salad of fresh greens with some asparagus tips sprinkled in and tossed with a bit of fresh squeezed lemon juice and olive oil. The salad is pretty easy, but for a good recipe for magret de canard a l’orange, I send you to Laura Tobin, at yourguardianchef.com. She is an Italian living in France, so you are sure to get the best of two great culinary traditions.

All I can do now is leave you a picture of my old “home town” in France (well, one of my old home towns in France but always my sentimental favorite). And when you go there, make sure to taste Tibouren or Antibois rosé. It will make you feel right at home.

Vieil Antibes (Old Town Antibes) and the famous ramparts with the Grimaldi Chateau and the Saracen Tower .

While you may not be on your way to Antibes soon, there is another way to taste good wines. Try Cellars Wine Club’s International Wine Club. The selection comes from the best vintners; there is a “no bad bottle” return policy; and shipping is free. Click here cellarswineclub.com or go to the Cellars Wine Club page on the right side of this screen.

Photos above are free stock photos or live-linked to specific websites.

Of Art and Wine affiliates with Bluehost.com and CellarsWineClub.com and may earn from qualifying purchases.

©marjorie vernelle 2020

Coming soon on Of Art and Wine, The Great Vedutisti of Venice, and Pinot Grigio Venezia.

Venice, Italy and the famous Rialto Bridge across the Grand Canal.

Now we take photos of Venice, but in the 18th century it was the painters who captured the unforgettable beauty of Venice. While Canaletto is the most famous, there were others who also became known as “vedutisti” or painters of Venetian scenes, like Francesco Guardi. Comparing the work of Canaletto, Guardi and the other vedusiti shows slightly different versions of the same city. Some views are more perfectly static and the others more granularly alive. How much of this was the city and how much was the artist’s temperament is fun to speculate upon.

Did Juan de Pareja lead a double life? Tempranillo!

Portrait of Juan de Pareja by Diego Rodriquez de Silva y Velázquez, 1650. The Metropolitan Museum, New York. metmuseum.org

Above you see the portrait of Juan de Pareja (1606 or 1610-1670). Look at him carefully. What do you see? Certainly his light cinnamon-colored skin and his full, unevenly shaped hair point to his Moorish heritage. He wears a white lace collar, slightly rumbled, over very ordinary, dark, well-worn clothing – no satins or silks. He looks out at the viewer with his eyes cast to his right, yet they still meet the viewer with sensitivity and intelligence. He is a person of quiet dignity, one who demands and deserves basic respect for his humanity. Juan de Pareja referred to himself as Velázquez’ “assistant.” By law, however, Juan de Pareja was a slave.

This is a self-portrait of Diego Rodriquez de Silva y Velázquez, painted in 1645. He is dressed as any fine Spanish gentleman of the time would have wanted himself to be seen. His clothing is dark as was the style, though one can detect a sleeve with the glimmer of a costly fabric and traces of silver here ad there. One hand is gloved and the other bare but curled back and resting on his hip (a painter would love to show off by painting that). He, too, looks to his right with one sharply focused eye while the other side of his face is in shadow. And yes, he also has a head of full, rather fluffy hair.

Velázquez came to Madrid from his home in Seville in 1622 and began making a name for himself. By 1624, the new king, Phillip IV, had moved the painter and his family permanently to Madrid. Veláquez became particularly famous for his portraits and ultimately became the favorite painter of King Phillip IV’s royal court. The culmination of that sojourn as court painter is Las Meninas (1656), his painting of the Spanish princess, Margarita Teresa, and various courtiers, with the indication from a mirror view of the King and Queen coming to visit the studio.

Las Meninas by Diego Velazquez. 1656 the Prado Museum in Madrid museodelprado.es

Velázquez was so in love with showing off his mastery that on one of his sojourns in Italy, on a visit to the Pope in 1650, he decided to do a quick portrait of his slave, Juan de Pareja. The portrait (see above) was of such quality and expression that when it was put on display “…in the opinion of all the painters of different nations, everything else seemed like painting but this alone like truth” (see metmuseum.org). There are some who say that the strength of the expression captured in this painting and its great acclaim led to Velázquez’ decision to free Juan de Pareja in 1650. So there it is, all wrapped up in a tidy package, a lovely story short enough for any online mini-biography. However, a deeper dive indicates something that might have been quite a bit different.

“Ni el mar tiene narajas, ni Sevilla tiene amor.”

“There are no oranges in the sea, nor is there love in Seville.” (my translation)

Velázquez was from Seville. However, he had an aunt who lived some 80 miles away in Antequera in the Province of Malaga. It was there in 1606 or perhaps 1610, about three years before (or one year after) the Moors were expulsed from the city, that Juan de Pareja was born to a Moorish slave named Zulema and a Spanish father named Juan. Zulema worked in the household of Velázquez’ aunt, but Zulema died when Juan was 5 years old, leaving him as a household slave. He was known in his lifetime as a sensitive, perceptive, and literate person. All of that must have begun in that household.

Here is where it gets interesting. Slaves were not allowed to become painters. In fact, during all the years that Juan worked in Velázquez’ studio, beginning in 1630, he was not allowed to paint by order of Velázquez, as slaves were not deemed capable of doing the kind of work the master painter could do. Velázquez was not necessarily evil for that, for he like others adhered to what was the societal norm. The thing is, of course, that it was self-serving as it helped eliminte competition and boosted the ego at the expense of someone else. Yet, before arrival in Madrid to work with Velázquez, Juan de Pareja had gone to Seville, and had passed the examination to be designated offically as a painter. In fact in 1630, the year he moved to Madrid after Velazquez’ aunt died and left her nephew all her property, de Pareja got permission from a high official in Seville to move to Madrid to further his studies in painting. These documents are referred to by those who question that Juan de Pareja was really a slave. Yet in 1650, the manumission documents issued by Velazquez to free Juan are also on record.

Did Juan de Pareja lead a double life?

Princess Margarita Teresa by Velazquez, 1656, and Portrait of a Girl by Juan de Pareja, date unknown

Here is my theory. Juan de Pareja, obviously went off to Seville, a city where he was not known as a slave and passed the exam that allowed him to become a painter. He also got formal permission for that move to Madrid most likely percipitated by the death of Velázquez’ aunt and her nephew’s taking over of her estate. However, the reason he gave in Seville was that he wanted to further his studies in painting. This would be in alignment with his status in Seville as a painter. It is said that Velázquez forbade Juan from painting, yet de Pareja painted in secret.

This leads to the most commonly told version of how he officially got emancipated in Spain. In 1654 King Phillip IV came for an official visit to Velázquez’ studio. Juan was to set up the display of paintings. In doing so, he put his own paintings up to be seen first. When the king arrived and marvelled at the wonderful work, de Pareja prostrated himself before the king and asked to become known as a painter. When Velzquez arrives to greet the king, his majesty says in shock that a man who paints like this cannot be a slave! Oops! Velázquez got the message and freed Juan. (There are manumission documents in Rome in 1650 showing that Velazquez freed de Pareja, so perhaps it had to be done in Spain, too.)

However, in an interesting turn about that probably hints at the long relationship of de Pareja and the Velázquez family, Juan de Pareja, who had worked with Velázquez for 24 years at that point, continued to work in his studio until Velázquez’ death in 1660. At that point, however, he worked openly as a painter. Juan continued to live and work in Madrid until his own death in 1670. There are at least nine of his paintings that hang in museums around the world, including in the Prado in Madrid, at the Hermitage in St. Petersburg, Russia, and several museums in the U.S.A. A full list of his paintings and the museums are given here en.wikipidia.org

In a way, art was Juan de Pareja’s personl burden and frustration, yet it may also have been his lifeline and ultimately his doorway to freedom. When I look at his famous portrait, I see not only dignity but also a quiet courage, the courage it took to be who he really was, a talented painter, even in a society that said he could not be that. For another perspective on this story and on the painting of Juan de Parejo, visit the Artist Project piece by Julie Mehretu on youtube.com.

For more on Juan de Pareja check these articles: “The Soul of Juan de Pareja” by Terence Clarke, huffpost.com; “Juan de Pareja” by Robert Fikes, blackpast.org; “A Closer Look at Diego Velázquez’ Portrait of Juan de Pareja – ONSTAGE” onstage.goodmantheatre.org; and for a scholarly article on Pareja’s life as a painter, there is “The Fall into Oblivion of the Works of the Slave Painter, Juan de Pareja” by Carmen Fracchia of the University of London on researchgate.net

In an update to the list of references above is a new article (04/09/23) in the New York Times “A Familiar Face at the Met, Now in His Own Light” nytimes.com

The paintings used here are in Public Domain.

The Wines of La Rioja, Olé!

The history of La Rioja as a wine producing area is long. In the 11th century B.C., the Phoenicians were present in the area and making wine. A thousand years later, the Romans were cultivating grapes there. In the Middle Ages the pilgrims to Santiago de Campostela passed through the area and reported on the wonderful quality of the wines. (What? Wine while on a holy pilgrimage! Why not?). One of the keys to the region’s success is a grape that is native to the area, the Tempranillo.

Tempranillo is a grape that ripens a bit earlier than other varieties, hence its name which is a diminutive of “temprano” or early in Spanish. It has a fruity taste of plums and cherries, as its deep color would indicate. With aging it might take on the aromas of tobacco, leather, clove, or vanilla. It has a medium range in terms of tannin and in acidity as well with a ABV of 13.5-14%. This is a grape that makes a full-bodied red wine that is a dream pairing with meats. Check out the recipes in the link below to the Last Bottle website.

Rosemary braised lamb shanks. Photo from the Last Bottle
http://blog.lastbottlewines.com/learn-wine/tempranillo/

Tempranillo is used in blends made in Rioja that are a good and less expensive alternative to French Bordeaux. There is another French connection and that came about in the 19th century during the phylloxera epidemic that destroyed many of France’s vineyards. With the devastation in France, French vintners came to Spain to invest in wine-growing areas and along with them came aging the wine up to 13-18 months in French Oak. This process gives the wines subtle notes of spice and allows some Tempranillo wines to have a flavor between that of Cabernet Sauvignon and Pinot Noir.

However, French Oak is expensive, so the Spanish growers sought out a more economical oak barrel and found it in America. American oak can be called “expressive” (how very American) and adds flavors of dill, vanilla, and even coconut. It is American oak that is used in the production of Vina Real Rioja Blanco, a white wine that pairs wonderfully with seafood and paella.

La Rioja has some 14,800 wine growers whose wines are present in 130 countries around the globe. It is Spain’s best wine-growing region and to quote a comment in VinePair.com, “La Rioja is Spain in a glass of red wine.” With so much going on there in terms of wine production made with Tempranillo and blends of it with other grapes like the Graciano, it is no wonder that the area is primed for wine tourism.

Haro is the epicenter of wine tasting in the general area and holds its own wine festival every year to celebrate St. Peter’s Day in late June where they party hearty. However, November 12th is specifically Tempranillo Day and internationally celebrated not unlike the French Beaujolais Nouveau at the end of November.

Ayngelina Brogan presents a little taste of what it is like to visit the bodegas (wine cellars) of Haro in her video “Where to Drink Wine in Haro” youtube.com For a more substantial tour, try “The Wines of Rioja and Ribera del Duero” youtube.com

The Tempranillo grape has found new homes around the world in South Africa, Argentina and of course, California which has the perfect cool nights and hot days that bring out the best in the grape. However, Spain is still its heart, producing a wide variety of wines either made of only Tempranillo grapes or ones in which the grape is blended with others. Age is important in things other than oak barrels, as Baron de Chivel wine proves by producing its dark cherry and spice-like aromas from 100 year old vines.

So there is no reason not to try this wonderful competitor to Bordeaux or other international wines. One way is to join a wine club like Cellars Wine Club which has an International Wine Club. See this link cellarswineclub.com or look at the Cellars Wine Club page in the right column under Pages.

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Coming Next on Of Art and Wine: Picasso and Matisse, plus Tibouren (Antibois) Wine

How wonderful! Matisse’s Dance being done to the strains of Picasso’s Guitar. Oh, had only their relationship always been as harmonious. Two of the greatest artists of the 20th century, two different temperaments, a great friendship, and a great rivalry all happened along the French Riviera. Perhaps a bit more of the wonderful light wines grown along the Côte d’Azur might have helped.