Another engraving for the contest of Vivanco and the ESDIR (i)

  As in 2014, also this year I have spent some days of spring to prepare something to present to the contest organized by the Vivanco winery and by the school of design of La Rioja.

  My attention to the subject of the wine, that was woken up somewhat by the commission I received for the Tralascuestas winery and that went on with the fresco of Laura and the engraving for the contest of last year, here has a new chapter. 

  I started with two ideas:

   The first idea retook the interpretation of the subject of the access to the world of the wine as a rite of initiation and growth that I had already treated on a drawing of much time ago inspired by a Picasso engraving I saw in Barcelona (which, by the way, is also in the collection of the Vivanco museum of Briones, in La Rioja) and, much later, in a fresco I painted in Rome on a brick.

Homage. Charcoal

Fresco

Watercolor sketches. "En la bodega"

  The other idea also had to do somewhat with an initiation process, but, this time, instead of a guy who watches how an adult is drinking from the "porrón", a young figure in a more intimate setting, an interior setting, - helped by the wine - places (or remove) a pair of glasses to another figure (i.e. he causes a change in the perception of the reality).

But I'm trying to be clearer with the subjects so that I descarded them.

As I live in La Rioja where many things revolve around the wine and the people drink so much, there have been many times in which I have felt fed up with this subject. 

I thought there would be two Bacchuses just as it was considered that there would be two Venuses and I did a variation of the famous painting by Tiziano:

 

  But not even it was much clear, was it?...

  So I decided to come back to the subject of Apollo fascinated by the world of Bacchus that I had treated in the engraving for the contest 2014 but now Apollo would change his strategy: he wouldn't photograph Bacchus while he was sleeping (nor he would chase after Daphne as the musicians chased after a "living" music) but he would deploy his ingenuity to attract the attention.

 First it was a graffiti artist who attracted the interest of other young people playing with a ball:

(The image of the graffiti is by Blue)

  And then a painter who was painting the front of his workshop (as I did with mine) and who attracts the attention of wine drinkers (also the people in my neighborhood stopped and talked to me when I did it)

  Apollo over a ladder was painting spirals of vines and grapes while drinkers with their wine glasses looked at him with curiosity and attention (mutual fascination finally?)

  The painter wore a shirt with an archer (the bow is the symbol of Apollo) inspired by an image of "The Arabian Nights" by Pasolini, that seemed to have like target the wine drinkers (the figures are based on "The forge of Vulcan by Velázquez).

"The forge of Vulcan", Velázquez.

"The Arabian Nights", Pasolini,

  But when I was going to etche the plates I got tired of all these detours and, without sketches, I etched on the plates the engraving I presented...

(to be continued)