Customer Reviews

Imagery: Art for Wine

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Bob Nugent is a both an artist and an art historian and was called upon to curate an exhibition for the San Francisco Museum of Art + Design, an exhibition which demonstrated the novel use of true art on the wine bottles and advertising of the various vineyards primarily of the Northern California locations. This book is a fine follow-up to that popular exhibition and gives the reader the opportunity to explore the manner in which this trend of incorporating fine art into the art of making fine wine occurred.

After an informative introduction by the always lucid and candid Donald Kuspit, the book is devoted to excellent reproductions of wine labels created not only by the author, Bob Nugent, but also including the art and design from such respected artists as Robert Arneson, Squeak Carnwath, Dominic DiMare, Don Farnsworth, David Gilhooly, Nancy Graves, Sol LeWitt and David Nash. Nugent describes the evolution of a proposed art idea to a finished product, allowing us to observe the permutations of the artist's concept as it makes it way onto the wine bottle. The wineries that have participated in this fascinating project include such well known names as Beringer, Groth, Stag's Leap, Chalk Hill and Forest Glen, Glen Ellen Winery, Benziger, Bonny Doon, Lingenfelder Vineyards and Frog's Leap.

Nugent writes well and with Kuspit's fine introduction has created a book of importance and certainly one that will be of interest to both Enophiles and as well as creative artists and designers. Grady Harp, July 06

The lavish and lovely IMAGERY: ART FOR WINE comes from a winemaker and Sonoma artist who back in 1985 decided to put original art on special wine releases. Their idea was to commission top artists to create the labels: two decades later their collection represents some of the top modern artists in the country. IMAGERY: ART FOR WINE gathers over a hundred of these works - the best of the Imagery collection - and pairs them with biographical sketches of each artist. Artist background, awards, exhibits and more help promote the individual while the label 'library in a book' displays full-page color photos of each watercolor and print. Small black and white photos of each artist are also included. An unprecedented work of art results in a collection to interest wine buffs and artists alike.

Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch

Few of us have the opportunity to view really great comtemporary art. When we visit the Met and the Louvre and other great art museums we marvel and gasp at the great masters of the last few hundred years. Comtemporary art by living artists is less understood and less available to view. When I was given a bottle of Imagery wine with a label by a famous living artist, Hung Liu, I stared at it and was moved by the art on the label. When tasting the wine, I was moved to tears of joy, at once grasping what the artist was expressing in her painting about the wine. This was a unique convergence of the arts of painting and wine making. What a marvelous esthetic experience! I set out to find more bottles of Imagery wine, each bearing a unique and special painting created for that wine. Then I found this book and learned the purpose of the wine family that has dedicated their lives and profits to the encouragment of great contemporary artists,much in the same tradition as the great art patrons like the Medici family. This collection of comtemporary art, all created for wine labels, will be a major contribution to the art world for now and centuries to come. If you love both art and wine, this is the one book to have.