Natural Wine, Gentrification, and the Flight to Authenticity
Todd Cavallo, a former graphic designer and bass player, left Brooklyn to make (natural) wine out in the Hudson Valley, New York. So, in some ways, he moves from one urban arena of gentrification to its rural counterpart.
So, the central arc of the piece is urban dissatisfaction that leads to rural escape, combined with a culture of artisanal production that now produces cultural legitimacy. This touches on the concept of artisanal capitalism, that describes an economic system in which authenticity, craft, intimacy, and ethical appearance become mechanisms of value extraction.
"Capitalism survives not because
it defeats criticism, but
because it incorporates it."
Luc Boltanski and Ève Chiapello develop this in ‘The New Spirit of Capitalism’. Their central argument is that capitalism survives not because it defeats criticism, but because it incorporates it.
"Two generations of
natural winemakers."
We start out with the meeting of two generations of natural winemakers in New York State. The owners and winemakers of Bloomer Creek had been described as the Original Gangsters of natural wine in the state (and potentially even the USA). Kim and Deborah meet Todd Cavallo, who had very recently moved from Brooklyn to the Hudson Valley to engage in wine production.
At the table is also Zack Klug and his business partner, who also produce natural wine in NY. I opted for the comparison of these two to be able to observe the difference between an early 21st century move to farming and wine making differs from when this was undertaken twenty years earlier.
Deborah, who is a painter herself, asked Todd, completely unprompted, whether he had been a musician, and he confesses to having been in a type of noise rock band, to no commercial success, but likens them to if the Velvet Underground had been less velvet. The positioning here is relevant, as we can see a progression of indie rock into artisanal production as an almost logical next step, or at least a continuity of anti-commercial thinking, DIY ethics, and relative obscurity as currency, but also both taking place within the context of commercialisation, within the context of artisanal capitalism.
"Menial labour into
cultural capital."
Deborah mentions that when Kim graduated from a prestigious college, his parents were ashamed because of his embarkation on a farming career, menial labour. Now he has been written about in the New York Times, which is a late approval.
Agricultural labour is historically devalued, until cultural institutions validate it, and it begs the question of what background you need to bring to farming in order to achieve this approval and validation. This converts “menial labour” into cultural capital.
"Everyone in Brooklyn
is making something."
Coming from Brooklyn, Todd says millennials might save farming, as it is considered a more noble pursuit. He mentions the maker community of Brooklyn, etc. It is a similar thing, Brooklyn keeps coming up, the mother of all gentrification, it is also a concept more than a place. Everyone in Brooklyn is making something. The labour did not change, but the symbolic framework did.
"Different values reorganise
land, labour, and price."
Back at Todd’s farm, he talks about gentrification and how it differs from Brooklyn, as urban gentrification means racial displacement to him, while in the countryside white people come into an area of more white people with different values. Particularly in the US, gentrification seems racially charged, but the different values that are being brought from Brooklyn exiles are significant.
They bring in not only different political values, but also an economy that is aligned to artisanal capitalism and therefore does not only occupy a more upmarket segment through pricing, but also a moral and aesthetic high ground. Gentrification is not only racial, it is economic, cultural, and infrastructural, and in some contexts intersects with skin colour. Different values still reorganise land, labour, and price.
Todd recognises this, but hesitates to fully own it.
"Authenticity is platformed."
Zack, the winemaker of the (now defunct) winery Litten Buffel, also in New York State, complains that “you’re excluded if you don’t match the most unicorn picture-grabbing Instagram wine process” as a winery, and alludes to the importance of Instagram and presentation in the world of natural wine.
Natural wine originally positioned itself against polished corporate branding, but now cloudy orange wine, fieldwork, tattoos, fermentation vats, and bearded heterosexual men have become a visual language optimised for social media. Authenticity is platformed, and the actors are not oblivious, as Todd quips, “the millennial in his natural habitat”, as I was recording him taking pictures of wine bottles on his iPhone.
This awareness of Todd, in particular, of how he is positioned and positions himself, strikes me as interesting, as it illustrates the fact that he is not a person who deliberately wants to feed a cultural and economic system that he might disagree with, but his situation is such that this is his best option and will achieve the best life for him.
"Thoughtfully grown grapes."
Same as the situation in which Todd meets the local farmers who grow the grapes he is buying, he is slowly steering them towards philosophies of biodynamic farming, etc. (At that moment, Todd marketed his wine as made from “thoughtfully grown grapes”.)
He explains Steiner half-seriously (and not entirely correctly), but is careful with his audience, to whom this still seems a bit outlandish.
"Natural wine often occupies
the space between science
and belief."
Todd produces “piquette”, a low-alcohol by-product of winemaking. Kim, who has been doing natural wine for decades, mentions he is worried people might think this is the definition of natural wine.
So natural wine, like all taste according to Bourdieu, requires training and, in a way, admission to the field.
And it happens sort of quickly, by a person encountering a natural wine and believing this is the definition of it. In fact, natural winemaking can produce all sorts of products (and, as a side note, if you produce extremely high-end Burgundy, you are likely to also do it according to principles that could be read as natural wine-adjacent, but will not position it that way).
This ambiguity matters. Natural wine often occupies the space between science and belief. It borrows ecological legitimacy while preserving esoteric charm.
"Sincerity does not
cancel structure."
Finally, at Litten Buffel, Zack Klug discusses the nature of wine as a product with his business partner, who says he understood that food and drink can be art, which was what led him into this industry. Zack disagrees with this notion, or at least tries to reject it, not its validity, but its application. He says that a $25 bottle of table wine is way too expensive to claim to make a food product, so if most people can’t afford it, you are not making a food product.
It reframes natural wine as classed consumption, not sustenance, but distinction. It does present as a dilemma however, as the price is also a reflection of the cost of a bottle of wine made in this manner. It is a dilemma.
Natural wine is both genuine agricultural craft and an elite cultural code.
The people I encountered in this research are sincere and aware.
It is also true that sincerity does not cancel structure.
Natural Wine, Privilege, and the Pursuit of Cultural Authority
Biodynamic Wine, Class, and the Future of the Rural
Natural Wine, Belief, and the Production of Authenticity
Ways to matter