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The Proust Q&A: Aurelio Montes Jr.
Sky diving fanatic Aurelio Montes Jr. is the son of Chilean wine pioneer Aurelio Montes. In 2001 his left his motherland to make wine over the Andes at Kaiken in Argentina where he practices biodynamics. He’s just released a traditional method sparkler aged on the lees for three years and a Cabernet Franc made from plots in Altamira and Vistaflores. He lives in Mendoza with his wife and three children.
What is your idea of perfect happiness?
For me perfect happiness is a combination of a few things that have to be in balance, but being at home with my wife, friends and great bottle of wines is practically perfection.
What is your greatest fear?
Losing someone from my family.
Which living person do you most admire?
The Pope.
What is your greatest extravagance?
I’m addicted to sea urchins!
What is your current state of mind?
Elated – it’s one of my happiest and most balanced times of my life.
What is the quality you most like in a woman?
A capacity for happiness and sensuality.
Who or what is the greatest love of your life?
My wife, then my wine.
When and where were you happiest?
When I travel aroud the world and when I ride my horse around the vineyard in the afternoon.
If you could change one thing about yourself what would it be?
I wish I didn’t take life so seriously.
Which talent would you most like to have?
I’d love to be able to sing.
What do you consider your greatest achievement?
My three children.
Where would you most like to live?
I love where I live in Mendoza, but if I have to choose another place to live it would be Tuscany.
What is your most treasured possession?
My collection of wines from around the world.
What is your most marked characteristic?
My passion, which fuses into everything I do, from winemaking to sports.
Who is your favourite writer?
Chilean novelist Isabel Allende.
Who is your hero of fiction?
Superman!
What is it that you most dislike?
Lies.
What is your greatest regret?
Life is to short to have regrets. In life there are good and bad experience but there’s no time for regrets.
What is your motto?
Live intensely and strive for perfection in what you do.
Who would be your ideal dinner party guests and what three wines would you serve?
I’d invite Pope John Paul II, Napoleon and Bono as it would be fascinating to get their different points of view on life. I’d begins the evening with my Argentine fizz, Kaiken Brut, and would move on to 2005 Solaia, ending the evening with Château Canon-la-Gaffèliere 1998.
This is a classic example of cookie-cutter journalism. That term is not a compliment. The journalist emails the interviewee, and they reply, and then the item gets published even though it mostly does not make sense, does not flow, contains contradictions, and represents the lowest-common-denominator style of journalism that I, as a journalist of 25 years, most abhor. Granted it’s easy to do and it’s cheap, but it has no soul and it provides little information apart from showing us the journalist’s limited ability to ask interesting and revealing questions. I know I sound like an old fart, but please give me some sensuality and passion and not formula journalism. I’ve interviewed Aurelio Montes junior and he’s a passionate man. This profile gives us little except platitudes.
Ditto, Stephen! I abhor this kind of so-called interview. I guess it’s too much effort to learn something about your subject in order to ask pertinent questions.