Matt Wilson Archives - South America Wine Guide

Award-winning British photographer, Matt Wilson has been based in Chile since 2003 and is renowned for his adventurous takes at life surrounding wine.

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“I’ll never shoot anyone with their nose in a wine glass,” he says, defiantly avoiding the cliches of wine photography. If you take a flick through his Instagram account, you’ll likely see more wine being thrown out of a glass than being poured into a glass!

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Some of his recent black and white portraits of personalities in Chilean wine (and somewhat further afield) are currently on tour in an exhibition around South America’s wineries and wine regions. Here we take a look at some of the highlights, and Matt explains a bit about the person or story behind the photograph.

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Michel Rolland

“I have known Michel for many years and have photographed him many times. Here I wanted a monochrome straight close portrait. Michel is always easy to photograph and always seems in a good and relaxed mood. This may be because I am not a winemaker, so he can also relax with me. This was shot at Clos Apalta winery.”

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Aurelio Montes

“This is Aurelio Montes. Iconic Chilean winemaker and businessman. I have known Aurelio since moving to Chile 15 years ago. A great friend and a pretty awesome winemaker. Here I photographed him in my studio for an exhibition last year, but the photograph will also go up in my new exhibition in Mendoza later this year.”

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James Suckling

“Here I photographed James Suckling. I film some of the videos for James’ website and know him quite well. Here he is blind tasting wines from Chile. I made this photograph at Montes winery in Apalta, in Colchagua. He has covered the bottles with paper bags. I liked the reflection in this image, and also the fact that James has his eyes closed in concentration.”

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Romina Pérez-Kallens

“Here I have photographed my assistant Romina Pérez-Kallens, she is holding a Lalique 100 point glass and a generic magnum of wine. We used a mirror in my studio to create the reflection.”

“Again this is of the same James Suckling designed 100 point Lalique glasses. These have recently been introduced to the Chilean and Argentinian market. I wanted to make as minimal an image as possible, using glasses and wine, but no labels. The focus is on the glass and bottle with Romina in very soft focus and only showing the tilt of the wine parallel to the open mouth.”

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Marco Puyo

“I photographed Marco in my studio using a mirror as a reflection. We wanted to make the wine without a label to make the image more minimalist. Marco wanted the photo to be quite serious. I have known Marco for around 13 years. When I first met him he was at Los Vascos, then at Viña San Pedro and now he has his own project in Perilillo in Colchagua. A beautiful vineyard and some great wines.”

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Grant Phelps

“I have been photographing winemaker Grant Phelps for about 14 years. I saw a photograph of Salvador Dali taken from above with a fisheye lens. I decided to try it with Grant doing a tasting at his hotel WineBox Valparaiso.”

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Jose (Pepe) Gallante

“I had to photograph Jose for Wine Enthusiast magazine. The afternoon light was great outside the winery’s famous barrel room (Salentein), where some gorgeous popular trees grow. We decided to use the sunlight through the trees as a backdrop. We used a reflector on Jose and after a few minutes, we got this wonderful cheeky smile.”

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You can see more of Matt’s photography on his website.

When it comes to wine photography, Matt Wilson doesn’t mind pushing the boundaries. And in doing so, he is painting Chile’s wine scene in a different light. Former rock and skateboard photographer Matt Wilson might be the bad boy of wine photography, but his emotive pictures are certainly turning heads and gaining him accolades along the way.

With a Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year and Born Digital Photography Wine Award under his belt to date, Matt has a refreshing approach to wine photography which moves away from staid barrel room portraits and tired landscape shots, instead focusing more on the characters of wine, the color of the landscapes and he frequently gets a winemaker to smash a bottle of wine against his head, or in the case of his latest ‘oeuvre‘ – chainsawing open a barrel filled with wine.

What’s the difference between photographing wine and rock ‘n’ roll? Not that much it turns out. “Wine is a lifestyle, and rock and roll is a lifestyle!” says Matt who also travelled the world with Hip Hop groups like The Roots, Mos Def and Method Man. Matt likes to photograph animated subjects though, and he does admit “musicians tend to be more animated than your average winemaker.”

But the wine world is changing, and it isn’t just Chile that is starting to shake off the old conservative image of wine. “It’s now about the Millennials,” says Matt commenting on the new interest in wine and buying power of young consumers. “Wine is becoming more accessible to young people.”

Wine has also become cool again. Celebrities like Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie are doing it, footballers like Messi are doing it, even Metallica have their own sommelier on tour. The appeal of Chile for Millennials, Matt believes, is not far behind. “I think it is a young person’s country,” says Matt. “There’s so much adventure to do here: the Atacama, mountains, skiing, rafting…”

Through his photography he is trying to show that side of Chile to the world. As the ‘go-to’ guy for Decanter, Wine Spectator and numerous other wine publications, Matt is representing the country on an international scale. As well as portraying real characters of winemaking, he specializes in documenting the manual workers and the reality of winemaking, deep in the vines. His down and dirty approach often leads him to discover some unsung heroes of the wine world.

When shooting at a historical winery in Maipo he started chatting to a vineyard worker who had been working there 50 years and that was his last day before retirement. “I just suddenly thought that this guy was older than me and had worked his entire life in that vineyard… I like showing the pride in people.” The portrait of his well worn but proud face was unfortunately lost in the earthquake, but similar portraits of vineyard workers are key in his wine photography portfolio and one of the reasons why he is a local photographer to watch.

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Matt Wilson

Black, white & wine all over