They’re grape works of art: Italian painter uses wine to create stunning pictures… which mature with age
It’s not unknown for artists to turn to drink as they struggle with the creative process. But one Italian painter has given that a entirely new meaning.
Elisabetta Rogai uses only white and red wine, with no other chemical additives, to create beautiful paintings.
The material means the paintings even take on the characteristics of a good wine, maturing with age.
The difference between a freshly painted artwork and a three-months-old one is clearly visible; the texture changes and the colours evolve from young purples and cherry reds to more mature tones of amber, orange and brown, she said.
Elisabetta added: ‘This allows the wine to reproduce on the canvas exactly the same process of ageing that normally takes place inside the bottle.
‘The wine aging, which normally occurs over the years, takes only a few months on the canvas.’
Elisabetta admits it took a long period of research and experimentation, and help from the University of Florence to develop her wine paintings, but the results were definitely worth it.
Although she uses regular bottled wine for her paintings she also takes bottles of wine to the Florence University laboratory for processing, and takes home a gooey residue with a texture similar to oil paints.
To keep the aging of the wine going on indefinitely, until the colours fade almost completely, Elisabetta has created a natural colour fixating system based on water and flour.
This leaves the hues unchanged but prevents colours from fading over a certain threshold.
Her wine paintings are available for prices starting at around £4,000.
TOM GARDNER
Daily Mail