Vin Gogh? Artist creates portraits using red wine

A New York artist has come up with a novel way of making the most of her leftover Cabernet Franc – using it to make portrait paintings. As reported on db.com, using a wax resist, 29-year-old Amelia Fais Harnas pours six to seven layers of red wine on top of white cotton in order to achieve the light and shade effects. To ensure the wine dries quickly, Harnas, an avid wine lover, has to work at around 27°C, rotating between four to six portraits at a time.

She discovered how to make the portraits by melting dead candle remnants in a coffee can over a propane grill and painting the wax resist on cotton bed sheets with an old paintbrush. “The idea of painting with wine developed slowly over a couple of years. I wondered if wine could be used as a pigment for my portraits and started experimenting with Cahors,” she told Solent News. “I'd love to be able to say it happened by accident, where I spilled wine and saw Jesus's face in it, but it really resulted from a series of what-ifs.

“I enjoy the challenge of trying to control the unpredictable nature of wine bleeding through fabric in order to channel the equally imprecise nature of a person’s character,” she added. Her portraits, many of which incorporate religious iconography, have been exhibited in New York galleries and Finger Lakes producer Damiani Wine Cellars, whose Cabernet Franc-based Vino Rosso is almost exclusively used in the portraits due to its deep colour and low residual sugar content.

"I’m intrigued by what effect wine quality will have on the works, and plan on experimenting with all sorts of grape varieties and regions to see how the colour, residual sugar and tannin content affect stain penetration, she told The Huffington Post. As to how long the portraits will last, Harnas is unable to give an accurate answer, though believes their ephemeral nature adds to the intrigue.

"I’m doing everything in my power to ensure they last as long as possible, but part of the excitement is how fragile the works are,” she said. Her works sell for up to £650, depending on their size, with a 20" by 16" portrait requiring just one glass of wine. Harnas plans to move to Paris to work on miniature portraits using French wine.

Wine on tap thriving in US

A growing number of US restaurants are starting to serve wine on tap from kegs. As reported on thedrinksbusiness.com, daring venues in San Francisco, LA, Las Vegas, Atlanta, New York and Detroit are all in on the act. The reusable, five-gallon kegs, holding the equivalent of 25 bottles of wine, store the product for more than five months, keeping by-the-glass wines fresher for longer. Pumped out from the keg, the wine is never exposed to oxygen, making the last glass as fresh as the first, thus creating zero waste.

Leading the wine by the keg charge in New York are Charles Bieler (pictured) and Bruce Schneider, founders of The Gotham Project, which makes a Riesling in keg from the east side of Seneca Lake in the Finger Lakes. Supplying to the Grand Central Oyster Bar in New York City’s Grand Central Station, the Red Rooster in Harlam and Terroir Tribeca in Manhattan, the dynamic duo are dedicated to changing the way Americans drink wine.

“We’re not just selling a concept, we’re selling a better glass of wine,” Bieler tells me. I wanted to do something locally. I was always amazed by the trend of eating local, but when it came to drinking local, people sort of ignored it.” Now 25 New York restaurants carry Gotham Project Riesling and an equal number outside the state have taken it on.

“We chose Riesling because I love it, but more importantly because it’s the wine New York State does best,” admits Bieler, who is working on putting a sparkling wine in keg. We want to offer wines that can compete with the best in the world at their price point.”

The flamboyant winemaker, who once traversed the US in a pink Cadillac wearing a pink tuxedo to promote his father’s Provence rosé, thinks Stateside wineries and retailers will jump on the keg bandwagon once they see it working in the on-trade. Bieler is toying with the idea of bringing the wine in keg concept to London. I could see wine on tap working in laid back wine-focused venues with extensive by-the-glass offerings, like Brawn, Terroirs, Vinoteca, Artisan & Vine and 28-50. Perhaps we’ll be drinking English sparkling on tap by the end of 2012?

Charles Bieler photo (c) James Estrin – The New York Times/Redux