SONOMA, CA.- Donum, one of the leading California Pinot Noir producers, has installed two monumental sculptures that recently joined The Donum Collection. These works join a growing collection of monumental, open-air sculptures that live harmoniously across Donum’s 200-acre estate, nestled between Napa and Sonoma wine regions. The Donum Estate has one of the largest accessible, privately-owned outdoor sculpture experiences in the world that has made it an international destination.
Founded in 2011, The Donum Collection is one of the largest accessible private sculpture collections in the world. More than 50 monumental works, including open-air sculptures are placed on The Donum Estate, a leader in single-vineyard, single-appellation Pinot Noir and Chardonnay from Sonoma in Northern California. Dotted throughout, each piece plays with scale, nature, and imagination. This evolving collection brings together a global community of artists, including works from leading practitioners from 18 nations, across six continents including Ai Weiwei, Ghada Amer, Doug Aitken, Lynda Benglis, Louise Bourgeois, Keith Haring and Subodh Gupta. Donum brings to life a delicate balance among wine, land and art that has made it an international destination.
Celebrating its 20th Anniversary this year, Donum’s terroir-driven wines reflect the energy and complexity of some of most celebrated regions in Northern California including the Russian River Valley, Carneros and Anderson Valley. Founded in 2001, the Donum Estate is located in the acclaimed wine region Carneros nestled between Napa and Sonoma Counties. Donum includes a state-of-the-art winemaking facility, an organic farm, contemporary hospitality experience and one of the largest accessible private sculpture collections in the world. Donum brings to life a delicate balance among wine, land and art that has made it an international destination. For the past two decades, sustainability has been at the forefront of the Donum Estate vision—Donum, in fact, is Latin for Gift of the land. Its biodynamic and organic farming practices create environments in which the vines can thrive and produce the highest-quality fruit as possible.
Thomas J Price (UK, 1981)
Price’s work across media, encompassing sculpture, film and photography, is engaged with issues of power, representation, interpretation and perception in society and in art. From his early performance piece, “Licked" (2001) to more recent large-scale “abstract” bronzes, Price has always utilised methods of presentation, material, scale, and detail in order to challenge viewers' expectations and assumptions. As an artist who is primarily led by concepts, Price has long been exploring the use of “figurative” sculptures as a device to engage with viewers in specific ways. These sculptures function as psychological portraits, depicting imagined subjects, whose features are in fact an amalgamation of sources: observed individuals, 'types' represented in the media, and ancient, classical and neoclassical sculptures. In this way the works ultimately serve as psychological portraits of us, the viewers, by revealing our socially learned attitudes and understandings as we create identities for the depicted characters. Importantly, Price’s practice extends beyond a strategy of figuration. In one example, sculptures of polished bronze are luxurious and monumental, first appearing to be abstract and rooted in the history of 20th century sculpture. They challenge our artistic institutions and the traditional holders of power to create an alternative narrative that seeks to highlight the mechanisms in place that reinforce cultural values.
Ugo Rondinone (Swiss, 1964)
Born in Brunnen, Switzerland, New York based Ugo Rondinone is a mixed-media artist whose works explore themes of fantasy and desire. Rondinone’s work is included in the following collections: The Museum of Modern Art, New York, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco and the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, among others.
