Review: Festival of the Arts & Wine Walk at The District at Green Valley Ranch
Despite its flaws, Hubby and I enjoyed our first time at the Green Valley Festival of the Arts & Wine Walk.
The wine:
Admission to the wine walk was $30 per person or $50 for a couple. For this, you got a punch card allowing you one 1 oz sample each of 20 different wines. So, the equivalent of 4 glasses of wine per person, if you sampled every wine available.
Unfortunately, the only copy of the wine list was posted at the entrance. The wine boothlings made a half-hearted effort to tell you the name of the wine you were sampling but they did not have any fliers you could take with you (I'm guessing that they were only hired for the event and were not representatives of the wineries). I think this lack of printed information on what you were sampling was a pretty big failing if the purpose of the event was to help people discover new wines to enjoy. I took a few minutes to jot down the wine list (sans the ridiculous descriptions) so we could later find the wines we liked. The vintage years were not posted.
We sampled about half the wines. Hubby and I aren't sophisticated wine drinkers so all I can report is whether or not we liked something. (The reviews below are based on my notes -- Hubby didn't take notes, but I don't recall any significant disagreement about any of the wines, so this is probably representative of his tastes as well.)
Our favorite wine was the Rosemount Estate Shiraz Grenache, and not just because their boothlings were the most generous pourers. :) We liked this one so much that we bought another bottle of it on our way home.
We also enjoyed the Rosemount Estate Pinor Noir, Bonterra Cabernet Sauvignon, J. Lohr Los Osos Merlot (very smooth), and the Sake 2 Me Ginger Mango and Asian Pear sakes. The J. Lohr Bay Mist Riesling was very, VERY sweet, but I could see it working as a dessert wine.
We didn't like the Bonterra Syrah, Bonterra Sauvignon Blanc (the "freshly cut grass" wine), Earthquake Zinfandel (a red zinfandel), Horseplay Rollicking Red, Climbing Shizaz, or Auto Moto Cabernet.
The art:
The art was very bland. I think that I could replicate about 1/3 of it and I have no artistic talent whatsoever. It's really sad when people think that they are so clever and talented but it's obvious that their "innovative new technique" is just slopping horizontal streaks of paint onto a canvas, letting it drip down and dry, then turning it upside down and declaring it to be an "abstract art" "landscape". If you splatter enough paint on enough canvases some of it will turn out looking cool, but that doesn't make you a talented artist.
The best "art" at this art show, in my opinion, was the nature photography. Amusingly, there is this one shot that every single desert photographer seems to take (from various angles), of light coming down through the rocks into a cave. Hubby and I have seen some version of this picture at almost every photography gallery we've been to in Las Vegas and I think we saw it three times at this art show. One of these days we're going to find out where it is and go visit and take our own picture of it too, just for kicks.
The ambiance:
The setting was The District, an upscale outdoor mall next to the Green Valley Ranch casino. They'd put up little white Christmas lights on all the trees and there was a nice jazz band playing. Since it was outdoors, several people brought their (leashed) dogs. The mall encourages this and even has little designated areas for the dogs to poop with poop bags available for cleaning up after them.
The crowd was mostly middle-aged, mostly upper middle class, about 90% white. I doubt that anyone there was very serious about either art or wine -- it's the sort of event people go to just to *feel* more culturally sophisticated. (Hubby and I are not so pretentious -- we were there because we like to drink.)
Compared to Lee's Wine Experience:
Lee's Wine Experience is better in every way. But it's probably not fair to compare the two, given that this is a local little monthly wine walk with 20 wines and Lee's Wine Experience is an annual blowout event in a huge ballroom with over 1000 wines.
However, scale is no excuse for the logistical problems (in fact, a smaller scale event should be easier to manage). The aforementioned lack of printed wine lists to take home was just dumb (whereas Lee's Wine Experience gives you a booklet with a list of all the wines and space to take notes). The wine lines were much longer and the event felt much more crowded than Lee's Wine Experience, despite a much smaller attendance. Some of the crowdedness might have been caused by this month's wine walk being combined with an art show (all those art booths take up space), so we'll see if future wine walks have the same problem.
Compared to the First Friday Art Walk:
The art at the First Friday Art Walk is much better, or at least much more memorable and thought-provoking. There are artists there whose studios I seek out for additional visits because their paintings stay in my mind, whereas everything at the Green Valley festival of arts was completely forgettable.
However, the environs -- downtown's "arts district" (aka the ghetto) -- of the First Friday Art Walk are a lot scarier. I don't feel safe walking back to my car after First Friday, whereas at no time did I feel unsafe at The District mall.
The First Friday crowd is also scarier. It's one of the only events in town that teens can go to, and the goth, emo, and punk kids show up in droves. I'd also guess that there is a lot of illegal drugs use and sales going on at the event. I feel much safer being surrounded by the nice upper middle class people at the Green Valley art walk than by the freaks and misfits at First Friday.
Conclusion:
The Green Valley wine walk (and sometimes arts festival) is kind of "meh" but we'll probably go again, especially since we can combine it with a movie at the Green Valley Ranch casino theater afterwards.
