Here are a few interesting facts for you to ponder over as you prepare yourself for our delicious artistic evening at the Guildhall Art Gallery.

• Champagne receptions, and their accompanying champagne cocktails, are so much a part of our culture that they are even the subject or artwork itself! (See Emma Freeman’s “Champagne Cocktail”)
• It has been suggested that champagne, consumed in moderate amounts, may help improve brain health, and since art is famous as being a tonic as well, what better way to be healthy than a champagne reception at an art gallery!
• There have even been riots over champagne! In 1910 and 1911, caused by a series of problems faced by local growers, the Champagne Riots resulted in the destruction of a great many vineyards, wine merchants’ cellars, and ransacked houses
• Champagne was called “The Devil’s Wine” by some critics in the early 1700s, as the processes of fermentation and carbonic gas were then unknown, and the explosive qualities of the wine meant that bottles often used to explode, sometimes setting of chain reactions in which cellars could lose 20-90% of their bottles. Cellar workers even had to wear heavy iron masks!

We do not, however, envisage any riots or references to men in iron masks for this lovely evening. Rather, we look forward to sharing an evening with you which will delight both your brains and your taste buds, and is sure to be memorable.

References
Wikipedia: “Champagne (wine)”
Wikipedia: “Champagne Riots”