The WINE GENESIS takes up where the winebook VINARIA left of. VINARIA has long been out of print and for this reason large parts of the original book have been reproduced.
In this new book, wine lovers will discover fresh features, like the description of the work in the vineyard and the complete process of winemaking from month to month as the year unfolds.
One of its most important features is the "ampelography" - the study of grapevines. With a series of photographs of grape varieties such as the world has never seen before.
Peter Oberleithner and Karl Mayer have managed to portrait not only the best known cultivars, but also those that have been long forgotten and provide a proper scientific assessment of their worth.

Leo Heinz
Editor

Precious Culture in Pictures

Making wine is a precious culture thousands of years old. In the course of millenia it has had its highs and lows, and yet from each new crisis it has emerged with its head held high. It has even survived periods of puritanism, nay, it has emerged unscathed from Prohibition; and why? Because wine is deeply embedded in the myths of human history as well as in important religions.

No one has ever produced such a fine photographic record of the genesis of wine from the vine to the glass as the Austrian Peter Oberleithner. Above all in his two differently conceived series of pictures of grape varieties. These are surely the most brilliant ampelographical depictions made in the twentieth century surpassing the watercolours that illustrate the great works of Viala and Vermorel (1901–1910) as well as the magnificent paintings by Grete Turkovic or Robert Flach.

Nor has the work of the grower ever been so completely and accurately observed as in this book, now reissued by Leo Heinz and the Kulinarium Verlag in a thoroughly updated edition aimed at a broader segment of the market. The first edition – “Vinaria” (1993) – was printed in minute quantities and envisaged only for collectors.

It is necessary to mention once again that Peter Oberleithner had a qualified partner in Karl Mayer from the Educational and Research Centre for Viticulture and Pomology, the oldest wine school in the world – founded in 1860.
It may be true that in our own lifetimes, oenology is developing faster than ever before, but most of what we see in this masterpiece remains true for all that, and a wholly timeless witness to a fascinating culture.

Willi Klinger
Managing Director
Austrian Wine Marketing Board