Miró, Chagall, Braque, Picasso, Tàpies, Francis Bacon, Dalí, Balthus and Jeff Koons are among the world's most renowned artists who have created labels for the famous Château Mouton Rothschild winery in the Médoc region of Bordeaux. The current 2023 vintage features a drawing by Portuguese artist Joana Vasconcelos. The motif depicts a cluster of grapes surrounded by elements essential to fine wine: earth and water, sunlight and the coolness of the night, and human hands.
A Vine from Paradise
The vine takes center stage and thrives in paradise, or paraíso in Portuguese, the name Joana gave to both: her artwork and the winery's terroir. The first label was designed by Jean Carlu for the 1924 vintage, and since 1945, the owners of Mouton have entrusted this task to artists on an annual basis.
Even England’s King Charles III, while still a prince, illustrated the 2004 vintage. Politics played a significant role in that choice. It marked the centenary of the Entente Cordiale, a British-French agreement in which the two nations settled how and by whom control would be exercised over Egypt, Morocco, Newfoundland, cities in Senegal, The Gambia, and Guinea, and territories east of the Niger River in Africa.
The Prince’s Landscape
That agreement gave rise to the Entente alliance, which would later emerge victorious in World War I. It comprised the United Kingdom, France, and the Russian Empire, though the latter collapsed in 1917, a year before the end of the first great war.
The Prince of Wales waited decades for the throne—so long, in fact, that there was even a question of whether he would ever ascend to it. He painted a watercolor inspired by the French landscape for the Mouton Rothschild label.
Wine-related motifs are encouraged
The winery states that artists enjoy complete creative freedom, though they do suggest certain preferred motifs: grapevines, the enjoyment of wine and the ram (the winery's emblem). The fact that the United Kingdom is a major market for them also played a significant role in the decision to select the current King as the artist.
Camille Sereys de Rothschild, Philippe Sereys de Rothschild and Julien de Beaumarchais de Rothschild are the owners of Château Mouton Rothschild. The winery is in the first category according to the Bordeaux classification from 1855, which included cellars on the left bank of the Gironde River.
Napoleon sought the best
It arose from the request of Emperor Napoleon III, who, on the eve of the world exhibition in Paris, requested a ranking of the best Bordeaux wines in order to present them to visitors from all over the world. It is the oldest classification of wineries in the world, but only wineries on the left bank of Bordeaux's Gironde river are in the game. And not all of it.
Consequently, Château Pétrus is absent. It hails from the Right Bank, where Merlot dominates and the wine has ranked among the world's most expensive for decades. The First Growth category, or Premiers Crus, as the French call it, has included Château Lafite, Château Latour, Château Margaux, and Château Haut-Brion from the very beginning.
The last to join the Big Five
Château Mouton Rothschild joined the ranks of the Big Five in 1973. That remains the only change to the list of top Bordeaux wineries to date, and it was the result of fifty years of lobbying by Baron Philippe de Rothschild.
Baron spent his youth as a Parisian bon vivant. He raced cars by day and spent his nights in bars. Upon seeing the vineyards his great-grandfather Nathaniel had purchased in 1853, he convinced his father to hand over the estate. The wines became exceptional in both: quality and price. The 2023 vintage, for instance, costs just over 500 euros (excluding tax). Here are five labels of Mouton Rothschild from renowned artists:
