Art and wine, a indissoluble combination that has gone through history. Wine is undoubtedly the drink that has most inspired artists and poets over the centuries in the production of artistic works, both in painting and sculpture.
The first testimonies are found in the paintings of ancient Egyptian art: the wine is exalted for its sacred, curative value and as viaticum for the deceased. A tradition that is perpetuated first with the Greeks, then with the Etruscans and Romans where wine becomes the iconographic protagonist of divinities but also expression of freedom and creativity. If in the Middle Ages artists showed less interest, with the Renaissance wine exploded again in its maximum expression. It was the Medicis in Florence who brought it back to the center of attention as an element of refinement and exclusive privilege. Then they come Michelangelo Buonarroti, Titian, Caravaggio. And so on up to our times.
Two young Roman entrepreneurs were inspired by this concept, Daniel Bianca, 20 years old, chef diploma from the Italian Chef Academy, 4 languages spoken fluently for having lived in international environments, management experience in the archaeological sector and large transports and Gianlorenzo Bernini, 25 years old, university studies at the Faculty of Art History of La Sapienza, in launching a new contemporary art gallery, “B ART Gallery”, in Via Natale del Grande, in Trastevere in Rome. An adventure faced with great enthusiasm that seems emblematic of the concept of restart, a gallery that aims at an innovative concept: it aims to enhance young talents, in a particularly difficult moment for a young person who wants to emerge. The idea is to enologically contextualize the artist in his territory of origin by combining the work of art on every occasion with a selection of excellent wines, chosen ad hoc, with the aim of also make the area where the artist trained a protagonist.
In doing so, the Gallery opens up to the public in a collective dialogical mode, borrowing the idea from the literary cafes of the past, when the artists gathered at Rosati's in Piazza del Popolo, where, wrote Ugo Pirro «Here in the Fifties you met Pier Paolo Pasolini and Elsa Morante, but also many young painters and filmmakers, all immersed in an atmosphere of cultural vivacity which, only years later, I can fully appreciate»; from Babington to Piazza di Spagna, from the Caffè Greco in via Condotti, where Giorgio De Chirico went to drink a cappuccino every morning, for whom «the Caffè Greco is the only place where you can sit and wait for the end of the world» . But where past, present and future were debated in a virtual transversal circle frequented by Goffredo Petrassi, Mirko, Pericle Fazzini, Mario Soldati, Mafai, Carlo Levi, Afro, Renzo Vespignani, Vitaliano Brancati, Sandro Penna, Lea Padovani, Orson Welles, Orfeo Tamburi , Ennio Flaiano, Libero De Libero, Aldo Palazzeschi. But there was also Palazzo Taverna which hosted the «International Art Meetings», wanted by the landlady Graziella Lonardi Buontempo, with the participation of critics, artists and intellectuals: from Pier Paolo Pasolini to Alberto Moravia, president of the Association, to Giulio Carlo Argan.
A wonderful world that disappeared nevertheless Daniel Bianca and Gianlorenzo Bernini still wanted to recreate a place where the public comes to know the author, but also to meet, but also to listen to some beautiful music, but also to drink excellent wine, but also to buy it. “It is a format that we invented for revisit the traditional and static concept of the gallery”, explains Gian Lorenzo Bernini.
The exhibition space is spread over 150 square meters, with an external courtyard and a vertical garden. Conviviality is at the heart of the project which aims to be an art square where people come to discuss and not just to look at works of art.
The format chosen precisely to keep the sense of collegiality alive is original: a short exhibition lasting approximately 72 hours.
We start with the ancient Greek term "Anabasi", which literally means going uphill referring to an expedition carried out from the coast towards the interior, but which in this case is an invitation to leave behind everything that forces real life to indulge in the enjoyment and speculation of the work of art.
The exhibition, curated by Gian Lorenzo Bernini, with a critical text by Eléna Geo Stoilova – proposes two young artists: Giovanni Lo Castro (Rome, 1997) of Sicilian origins, hence the pairing with Sicilian wines, and Giorgia Grassi (Rome, 1997).
For the combination of wines in homage to the Sicilian origins of Lo Castro, a selection from the Cellars of one of the most famous island wines in the world, Firriato. The company started in the early 80s with the enological passion of Salvatore Di Gaetano in the extraordinary countryside of the city of Trapani, an agricultural area deeply marked by the cultivation of vines and the culture of wine, located between the sea of the Trapani coast and the majestic fortress of the ancient city of Erice. Starting from the first plantings of Nero d'Avola, Catarratto and Ansonica, conducted with the scruple of modern viticulture centered on a new concept of wine quality that has its primacy right in the vineyard and in its agronomic management. And built step by step like a winery with an eye to the most demanding and prepared markets. It is the Sicily of wine of enological quality and of great wines that is appreciated not only in Italy but throughout the world and Firriato is among the first companies that marked the renaissance of Sicilian wine that manages to best interpret this new dimension and international perspective.
by Firriato are proposed: two reds, Nero D'Avola doc Chiaramonte 13,5% 2018 and Syrah Altavilla della Corte 13,5% 2017. Among the whites, Grillo Altavilla della Corte 12,5% 2020 and organic Catarratto Gaeles 12,5% 2019 There is also room for bubbles with Firriato 12 Rosé Charme 2020%.
