Wine and art are two different fields strongly connected. Wine is an edgy and elegant form of art. Furthermore, art can be defined by wine. And this is where they meet each other, in the “wine art” atelier ELENA BAVELI. These paintings are exclusively made out of 100% wine and no other substances have been used.
Elena Baveli started painting when she was 5 years old. Through years of travelling all around the world, tasting different wines from all regions and appreciating art in all its forms, the idea of painting with wine was inevitably born. This call, derives from a natural desire for using Eco-friendly colours, without any chemical additions. Moreover, painting with wine can be an intriguing and vivid process. Wine gets matured on the canvas, similarly to bottle ageing. However, it happens faster on paintings and can be profoundly visible because of active colour changing.
Colours evolve from one palette to another, as time goes by. All these changes can be easily noticed. From red to blue. From orange to brown. From pink to purple. It is amazing what oxidation is able to create. Red wines that start out in a richer red colour, will actually lessen their strength. White wines, which are more luminous, will go darker thanks to polymeric chains.
Colour changing has to do with the impact of oxygen and the amount of tannins in the wine. Tannins are basically molecular compounds of wine, called “phenols” that can influence the way a wine looks as it ages. Red wines have more contact with the grape’s skin, than white wines during winemaking process. So tannins are always higher in red wines. Despite of that, white wines tend to enrich their colour during aging, going from a lighter golden, to a full body yellow sandy gold. More often, this is the result of over-oxidation, than any heavy tannin concentration present in the wine.
I am always left spell-bounded by the poetry of wine, in all aspects. It is truly extraordinary, when pieces of art are alive and able to express themselves. Able to adapt to environmental conditions, able to speak and interact with us. And for me this is the definition of art. Creation and communication of feelings and ideas.