Down with Artful Wine?

Speaking of great producers - Mr. William Downie is in town.
Bill is a renowned fairly natural Pinot winemaker in the Yarra. Part of the infamous South Pack which seems to equal confident, young and male producers of the area. I gather it'd be open to new applicants? I got my eye on snatching the much needed female spot in the not so far future. ;)

Anyhow.

At Terrior, with a few friends, colleagues, above mentioned and the cloudiest wines we could find on the list, we got into a most classical discussion  - is wine art?
What do you think?
What is art?
He was interestingly thoroughly against the idea. William started as a recording technician before embarking on the wine journey. He clearly sees the part of a winemaker equal to the the part of a recorder - you do not create anything you just try your damned hardest to "record" the metamorphosis of grapes turning into wine. In his own words "you must be an idiot to fuck it up"!
I understand what he is saying. I am at heart an emotional explosion in a scrabble factory. I personally feel a great need to express myself, I therefor have a wish that I may find a way to do that through wine. My gosh. That idea was totally squashed by him.
I quickly thought to mention photography as a recognised way of creating art but he had none of it.

Either way William is surely an interesting man. He makes his Pinot under a label that was made by an artful family friend. I visited The Yarra late last year for the first time and one of the things that struck me the most was the fact that his label - a landscape'ish view of the area with rolling hills and that green/blue tint of light - describes it so well. At this point in time he is another guy who oversees but doesn't own the vineyards his grapes come from. But not for long. An area has been planted and is being carefully nursed by Bill and his wife as we speak.
He also tells us he's gotten involved with a very interesting much supported new venture. Stand by.

Charlotte x