Johannesburg Auction Week
Live Virtual Auction, 6 November 2022
Coats Family Cellar | Iconic Bordeaux
About the SessionThe Coats Family Cellar is arguably the most prestigious fine wine collection ever offered in South Africa. It contains a deep collection of the worlds finest, most sought-after wines, spanning over 150 years. Collected over many decades, the cellar was imported from Ireland to South Africa via reefer. Each bottle within the Coats Family Cellar was authenticated by Michael Egan in August 2022 and given an ID number for tracking.
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About this Item
Château Mouton Rothschild is not only one of the finest Bordeaux wines, but it is also one of the world’s greatest. The First Growth from Pauillac holds an incredible track record for the most consistent and long-lived wines in all of Bordeaux. It can be argued that the modern age of Chateau Mouton Rothschild arose along with the modernization of the entire Bordeaux wine region.
Each year since 1945, the Château Mouton Rothschild label has been illustrated with an artwork by a leading painter, specially created for the vintage. Thus, the most famous names in contemporary painting have been brought together in a collection to which a new work is added each year. From one label to another, Mouton Rothschild has thus brought together some of the most celebrated artists of their day, including Miró, Chagall, Braque, Picasso, Tàpies, Francis Bacon, Dali, Balthus, Jeff Koons and even Prince Charles, the Prince of Wales. The artists have complete freedom of creation, though certain themes, such as the vine, the pleasure of drinking and the ram, the Mouton Rothschild emblem, have proved a particularly rich source of inspiration.
The 1961 vintage features a work by French abstract artist, Georges Mathieu (1921-2012). The self-proclaimed creator of “Lyrical Abstraction”, Georges Mathieu invented a wild, fantastic system of signs that he sees as the expression of his own inner primordial violence.
“Painting”, he wrote, “has to be an act” – a battle with the canvas in which Mathieu, with a strong streak of exhibitionism, creates works of swirling, tormented and violently-coloured movement, often in front of an audience. The explosive dynamism of Georges Mathieu's work for the 1961 Mouton Rothschild label is in typical Mathieu style. This lot contains bottle number 065092.
Critics Ratings
‘The 1961 Mouton Rothschild is one of those elusive wines that until now I have never tasted. Deep in colour with remarkably little ageing on the rim, it has a stunning bouquet with blackberry, briary and wild heather aromas. Graphite and leather emerge with time, after five minutes matching the ethereal quality of Palmer. The palate is beautifully balanced with enormous depth, subtle marine scents infusing the black fruit, later freshly picked mint. There is an effervescent quality about this Mouton Rothschild, a supremely gifted wine that dares to challenge the supremacy of the 1961 Latour. What a fabulous wine.’ - Neal Martin, 98/100 (Oct 2019)
‘A bottle that had been decanted 12 hours previously and, although there was the tiniest suggestion it has not been freshly opened, was absolutely stonking. So rich, sweet and concentrated yet with no dryness at all. Absolutely luscious. So rich, sweet and round – and actually livelier than the 1959 served alongside that had been decanted only a couple of hours before.’ - Jancis Robinson MW, JancisRobinson.com, 20/20 (Jun 2015)
Provenance
The Coats Family Cellar is arguably the most prestigious fine wine collection ever offered in South Africa. It contains a deep collection of the worlds finest, most sought-after wines, spanning over 150 years. Collected over many decades, the cellar was imported from Ireland to South Africa via reefer. Each bottle within the Coats Family Cellar was authenticated by Michael Egan in August 2022 and given an ID number for tracking.
Michael Egan is a world-expert in fine and rare wines with more than thirty five years of experience. He was the principal expert for the plaintiff in the two major wine counterfeiting trials in Koch v. Eric Greenberg and United States v. Rudy Kurniawan, both of which occurred in 2013.
Along with Michael Egan, the Strauss & Co Fine Wine team have tasted extensively through the cellar and are confident of the wine storage and hence quality. The entire collection is currently stored at Wine Cellar.
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