The Daily Union - January 20, 2008 ~ Gail Parsons

It’s been an interesting week for news related to the arts. Locally we are able to announce the start of a new Emerging Artist course.
In the Studio
The six-week art course will explore art styles of several famous artists. Children will work with two- and three-dimensional concepts. The Emerging Artist classes begin on Tuesday for children in grades kindergarten through second and on Wednesdays for children in third through fifth. Classes will begin at 4 p.m. and are held at the JCAC Art Studio, 107 W. Seventh St.
The six-week course is $50.
A mystery is solved
It’s been a centuries-old mystery, “who is the Mona Lisa?”
Rumors have circulated that the famous portrait is that of Leonardo da Vinci’s mother, some claimed it was actually a self portrait of the painter himself. However, a recent discovery of a book containing notes written in the margins by a friend of Leonardo da Vinci, puts to rest any doubt of who the enigmatic figure is.
Those who guessed the portrait was that of Lisa Gherardini, wife of Francesco del Giocondo have been proven correct.
The notes were written by a Florentine city official, who was an acquaintance of the artist, in a collection of letters by the Roman orator Cicero. These comments compare Leonardo da Vinci to the ancient Greek artist Apelles and stated that da Vinci was working on three paintings includind a portrait of Lisa del Giocondo.
The notes were written in the same time frame that the painting has been dated to.
Price of wine affects the taste
I’m not ashamed to admit that I can enjoy a glass of inexpensive sangria. But I also have long joined the mainstream thinking that fine wine had to be the expensive. The more it cost the better it tastes, right? How could a box wine or a $5 bottle possibly provide the same quality taste sensation that the $50 bottle does. I’ll admit also that some of those expensive wines – I don’t like. Does that mean my palate is not sophisticated? Apparently not.
Thanks to a group at the California Institute of Technology those of us who thought we had less refined palates because we don’t gravitate to the expensive stuff, can be assured that we simply don’t fall for elite marketing ploys.
This group from CIT put to the test the idea that the part of the brain that reacts to a pleasant experience would respond more to a wine with a higher price tag than a lower price tag – even when the wine itself was the same.
In the study, wine tasters sampled several wines while undergoing MRIs of their brain activity.
Two of the wines that were part of the study was one that retailed for $90; that wine was provided with its real cost and again marked at $10; another was presented at its real cost of $5 and the fake cost of $45
Both times the MRIs showed the test subjects were receiving a higher level of pleasure when consuming what they thought was the higher priced wine than the lower one, even when they were sampling the same exact wine.
When not given any price comparisons the test groups rated the $5 wine over any of the others.
Cheap does not mean poor quality and expensive does not mean better, which I’m glad for because I do appreciate inexpensive – but I demand quality.