"Billy Budd" – with Port labels
Posted: 09:35 Tue 08 Sep 2020
The attached image is by my late friend Valentino Monticello, who was the sommelier at Harry's Bar for many years.
A talented artist and passionate lover of opera, a 1986 commission to create a mural prompted Valentino to experiment with collages comprised of wine labels. Cutting out and arranging the figures in incredible detail, his signature method was established.
Said Valentino: “All of my pictures are composed of shapes carefully cut from wine labels: the people, the flowers, even the lines, are carefully cut from different wine labels. There is no drawing or painting involved at all.”
He would soak the labels off bottles, sometimes allowing several weeks for this to happen.
Among the Port labels in this image, which illustrates a scene from Britten's opera "Billy Budd", are Cockburn's 1955; Dow's 1963; Fonseca (Guimaraens) 1957, 1962, 1963, 1965, 1966, 1967, and 1974; Dalva 1985; and Croft 1963.
A talented artist and passionate lover of opera, a 1986 commission to create a mural prompted Valentino to experiment with collages comprised of wine labels. Cutting out and arranging the figures in incredible detail, his signature method was established.
Said Valentino: “All of my pictures are composed of shapes carefully cut from wine labels: the people, the flowers, even the lines, are carefully cut from different wine labels. There is no drawing or painting involved at all.”
He would soak the labels off bottles, sometimes allowing several weeks for this to happen.
Among the Port labels in this image, which illustrates a scene from Britten's opera "Billy Budd", are Cockburn's 1955; Dow's 1963; Fonseca (Guimaraens) 1957, 1962, 1963, 1965, 1966, 1967, and 1974; Dalva 1985; and Croft 1963.
