Qualla: Where Vineyards Became a Canvas

Where Vineyards Became a Canvas: Introduction

Thu, 02 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit AmsLems, CC BY-SA 4.0. The stone winery had already lived several lives before Rene di Rosa found it. Built by two Frenchmen in 1886, it had survived phylloxera, held mushrooms, hidden moonshine, stored grain, and sheltered hay. By 1960, when di Rosa bought the property in the Carneros region of southern Napa County, the building and its 465 surrounding acres had collapsed into disuse. Most new owners would have bulldozed the ruin and started fresh. Di Rosa added doors, windows, interior rooms, and a bell tower. Then he hung paintings on the walls and started filling the grounds with sculpture. What emerged over the next four decades was one of the most unlikely art collections in the American West: 1,600 works by Northern California artists, scattered across meadows, galleries, and the shores of a 35-acre lake that di Rosa himself had dammed into existence.

Image: AmsLems | CC BY-SA 4.0

Where Vineyards Became a Canvas: The Reporter Who Collected

Thu, 02 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit AmsLems, CC BY-SA 4.0. Rene di Rosa was born in Boston in 1919 and graduated from Yale, where he edited the Yale Daily News. After serving as a Navy lieutenant in World War II, he took a reporter's job at the San Francisco Chronicle in 1950. The assignment placed him near North Beach during one of the ...

Image: AmsLems | CC BY-SA 4.0

Where Vineyards Became a Canvas: Winery Lake and the Art Park Dream

Thu, 02 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit AmsLems, CC BY-SA 4.0. Di Rosa planted vines and established Winery Lake Vineyards in 1963, eventually covering some 250 acres. The property's lake began as a modest irrigation pond dug by WPA workers in the 1930s. Di Rosa built a dam and expanded it into an approximately 35-acre body of water he named...

Image: AmsLems | CC BY-SA 4.0

Where Vineyards Became a Canvas: The Collection Under Siege

Thu, 02 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit AmsLems, CC BY-SA 4.0. In July 2019, the foundation's leadership announced plans to sell most of the 1,600-work collection, retaining only several hundred pieces. The reaction was immediate and fierce. Artists whose work hung in the galleries organized petitions. Mark di Suvero, Peter Saul, and dozens ...

Image: AmsLems | CC BY-SA 4.0

Where Vineyards Became a Canvas: Art Among the Egrets

Thu, 02 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit AmsLems, CC BY-SA 4.0. Di Rosa's programming reflects the landscape it inhabits. Rotating exhibitions in the galleries draw from the permanent collection and feature emerging Bay Area artists, but the site's identity extends well beyond its walls. The sculpture meadow places large-scale works in dialog...

Image: AmsLems | CC BY-SA 4.0