Every Stroke A Small Courage
TASTING NOTES: “The Foley Sonoma Winemaker Series includes wines hand crafted and selected by our winemaker. Each wine in the series embodies a distinct representation of terroir which is illustrated by the hand painted watercolors depicted on our label. This Cuvée comes from our estate vineyards on the Foley Sonoma property. The watercolor artwork on our label illustrates the special sense of place of this Alexander Valley vineyard.” (AbV 14.8%, pH 3.76, TA 5.95)
VARIETALS: Not specified
BARRELS: 19 months in French oak (1-year old)
PAIRS WITH: N/A
THAT REMINDS ME OF: Watercolor labels.
There’s a particular kind of childhood magic in a watercolor painting that oil and acrylic just can’t touch. Something about the way pigment blooms outward when it hits wet paper — unpredictable, alive, a little out of control — that makes it feel less like something made and more like something that happened. Which is maybe why watercolor became the medium of choice for field naturalists in the 18th and 19th centuries. Before photography, if you wanted to document a new species of bird or orchid you’d found in the jungle, you brought a watercolorist. You brought someone who could capture a living thing quickly, before it wilted or decayed, in a medium that had the same translucent delicacy as the subject itself. John James Audubon, the definitive bird man of American art, worked in watercolor and pastel. His Birds of America plates — all 435 of them — are so kinetically alive that ornithologists still argue about whether they’re science or art. The answer, obviously, is yes.
The funny thing is that watercolor fell out of fashion among “serious” artists for exactly the reasons it’s so good: it forgives nothing, it can’t be easily corrected, and it dries lighter than it looks when wet, meaning you’re always working on faith. You have to commit. Every stroke is a small act of courage, or at least a small act of optimism. Which feels, actually, like a very reasonable philosophy for both making wine and painting vineyard labels.
