Monday, January 7, 2013

Wine Tasting and Paintings


This is an analogy of Appreciation of Paintings to Wine Tasting.


1. Balance - Acidity, Alcohol, Sweetness, (Tannin for Red wine) should be well balanced.

Acidity - Philosophy. Spirituality. Something casing a man to think.

Alcohol - Level of Technique

Sweetness - Idea. Visual pleasantness.

Tannin - Background knowledge and experience as a painter

2. Length -  Lasting aroma after drinking (more precisely in the throat after swallowing). The longer the better.

Lasting Impression.
Not get bored even seeing it hundred, thousand times.

3. Intensity - Intensity on the palate (the definition of wine intensity varies with wine writers)

Some basic things inherent to a painter. It may change with age. Great painters show better changes with aging. Or sureness of future improvement.

4. Complexity - the group of aromas

Aromatic atmosphere emitted by a painting, usually by combinations of several different factors like composition, curbs and straight lines, colors - warm and cold, light and heavy, dark and light. Symmetry and asymmetry.

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Value
Unlike industrial products wine and paintings have no specifications showing the guaranteed quality or performance (something affecting to a viewer in case of paintings). The specified performance is a large part of the value of an industrial product while the brand also contributes to the value or say price. The values (prices) of wine are also very much rely on the brands. Tasting might help but it should not be much influenced by the other people's opinion even those of the specialists. You must taste wine by yourself and judge good or bad or somewhere in the middle by your standard. The basic functions of the nose and the tongue are the same  for almost every body but vary much with individuals at the stage of appreciating wine. My nose does not work well even after some effort and training. It is difficult to develop the functions of the nose and the tongue much from the ones you inherited from your parents.
Fashion products like clothes, shoes, bags are more like paintings than industrial products but clothes, shoes, bags are in most cases necessity as well but wine and especially paintings are not necessity for basic human living.
Like wine and fashion products the values (prices) of paintings are very much depends on the brands, lot more than industrial products - the prices of famous painters' paintings are generally much higher than those of not so famous painters. And the price differences are extreme. There are no absolute specifications, no standards to judge good or bad. Brands have been made by various ways, partly made intentionally or even commercially which is not right in terms of genuine art. "Time" sometimes reveals this. Tastes, either personal or social,  also change with time.

Knowledge
Knowledge will help to appreciate wine and paintings. To encounter new knowledge, widen and deepen your knowledge itself is pleasure.

Used as investment and pleasure
Wine and paintings are used for investment as well as for pleasure while fashion products are usually not used for investment probably because fashion changes the values with time quickly although some have cyclical and retro values. Investment for real estate is sure than wine and paintings as it is highly likely that you would get constant income as rent. But you are not able to get pleasure of appreciating or tasting from the real estate you have except enjoying the ownership.

AAG