At 10am CET on Wednesday, December 1, the images of the bottles in this sale will change from being “Featured Artwork to be unveiled on 1 December 2021” to the images of the actual artwork on the 2019 label. This lot will close at 7pm CET on the same day.
The link between wine and art is an integral part of the history of Château Mouton Rothschild and, since 1945, Château Mouton Rothschild has prided itself on its collaboration with the leading names in contemporary art who each year create a unique artwork to illustrate the label of their First Growth Wine.
Sotheby’s is delighted to be part of this symbiosis with this exceptional sale Château Mouton Rothschild 2019 | Artist Label Reveal | First and Ultimate Lot
It is a great honor to celebrate the revealing of the artist of the 2019 label on the very day that the label is unveiled to the world with a unique offer of a rare lot composed of six Bottles, three Magnums, one Double Magnum, one Imperial and one Nebuchadnezzar of this vintage, direct from the Château.
The sale features an outstanding range of formats including a Double Magnum - signed by the artist and the owners of Château Mouton Rothschild - and the ONLY Nebuchadnezzar currently available for sale, from an extremely limited production.
To celebrate this unique sale and the 2019 label unveiling, the Château will invite the successful bidder to collect the lot in person at Château Mouton Rothschild, accompanied by up to five guests. A private tour of the estate and an exclusive lunch hosted by one of the owners of Château Mouton Rothschild in one of their Pauillac estates will be offered.
At Sotheby’s, we have had the great honor of bringing to market many of the world’s most prestigious Art & Wine collections and it is a privilege for us to collaborate with Château Mouton Rothschild to present this exceptional sale to our wine-and-art-collecting friends.
The proceeds from this auction will be donated to The Fondation Bergonié. The Foundation Bergonié supports the funding of targeted research programs carried out by the non-profit private hospital Institut Bergonié, a European benchmark in cancerology, specialized and recognized for its treatment of breast and uterus cancers and soft tissue sarcoma. It is Bordeaux’s only regional comprehensive inpatient and outpatient center for the fight against cancer. Faced with 18 million new cases of cancer per year worldwide, the research made possible by funds is focused on the development of therapeutic and technological innovation aimed at providing the best possible support to those who are battling cancer. Selected by Baron Philippe de Rothschild SA’s employees for the 2021 Philippine de Rothschild Corporate Foundation annual gift to a local cause, Château Mouton Rothschild will be donating proceeds from this unique auction to strengthen its support to the Fondation Bergonié.
Serena Sutcliffe, MW describe this exeptional wine:
90% Cabernet Sauvignon, 9% Merlot, 1% Petit Verdot. Phenomenal wine for the future, with its intrinsic, but not overt, power. All the myriad black fruits, but what class in the tannins. Everything is so ‘natural’ here, nothing exaggerated, but everything magnified. That is greatness.
“Mouton, as it is affectionately known by all its devotees, is the most opulent and exuberant of all the Firsts, a reflection of the two huge personalities that headed the Château since 1920, Baron Philippe and then Baroness Philippine de Rothschild, who sadly left us a few years ago. The great cassis depths of this wine seduce everyone who appreciates the finest Bordeaux. It is a gloriously forceful, flamboyant wine, voluptuous and powerful signed by Philippe Dhalluin, Mouton's talented General Director and Head Winemaker from 2003 to 2020 and Jean-Emmanuel Danjoy, the current Head Winemaker. The stunning beauty of the wines has been further strengthened by meticulous attention to detail in vineyard and cellar.Many of my own greatest wine drinking experiences revolve around Mouton throughout this century and the last. Magnificent Mouton is a sensory photo on the mind that stays with one for life.”
Every year since 1945, the Château Mouton Rothschild label has been illustrated with an original artwork by a great contemporary artist.
In 1924, to salute his first vintage bottled entirely at the Château, Baron Philippe de Rothschild (1902-1988), father of Baroness Philippine (1933-2014), asked the famous poster designer Jean Carlu to create the Château Mouton Rothschild label. Ahead of its time, it remained an isolated initiative.
In 1945, this time to celebrate the return of peace, Baron Philippe decided to crown the label for the vintage with the "V" for Victory, drawn by the young painter Philippe Jullian. This exceptional circumstance marked the start of a tradition and, every year since 1946, a different artist has been invited to create an original artwork for the label. Initially, Baron Philippe chose painters from amongst his friends, such as Jean Hugo, Léonor Fini and Jean Cocteau. Then, in 1955, Georges Braque himself agreed to illustrate the vintage. He was followed by the greatest artists of our time, including Dalí, César, Miró, Chagall, Picasso, Warhol, Soulages, Bacon, Balthus, Tàpies and Jeff Koons, forming a fascinating collection to which a new work is added each year.
Mouton Rothschild’s owners, Camille Sereys de Rothschild, Philippe Sereys de Rothschild and Julien de Beaumarchais de Rothschild, the latter now responsible for producing the label, have always respected the freedom of the chosen artists, though many of them have been attracted by themes such as the vine, the pleasure of drinking or the ram, the Mouton emblem. The artists receive no fee for their work but are given cases of Château Mouton Rothschild, including of course "their" vintage.
In 1981, on Baroness Philippine's initiative, the collection gave rise to a travelling exhibition, "Mouton Rothschild, Paintings for the Labels", shown in many museums around the world. It is now on permanent display at Mouton in the superb space created for it by Baroness Philippine in 2013, between the vat house and the famous Museum of Wine in Art. Enhanced by a new artwork each year, the exhibition needed refurbishing and will reopen, finer than ever, in 2022.
Source: Sotheby's Wine
Photo Credit: Sotheby's
