The Cantine Argiolas winery is situated in Serdiana, amidst the hills of Parteolla, just a few kilometers from Cagliari. Great Sardinian wines are produced here, Turriga, Korem, Angialis, Iselis and a centuries-old tradition is cultivated: a tradition started by the founder of the family, Antonio, which the third generation of his grand- children, Francesca Valentina, Elia and Antonio, is keeping alive today.
The Cantine Argiolas winery is also a place of hospitality and culture, the symbol of a sustainable and innovative Sardinia, capable of passionately and skillfully combining the great tradition of food and wine with creative industries and the new technologies at the service of the environment and the region.
This was the ideal place to hold the final day of the European Cinema and Audiovisual Days 2015, for drawing comparisons between the “new peasants” and the professionals of the national and international audiovisual sectors, for reflecting on the frontiers of cinema and “Made in Italy” food and wine.
The presence of experts and exponents of agro-ecological rural society associations reinforced the urgency of building “a network of on-line and multi-platform knowledge”, explained Claudio Papalia of Fert Rights, Turin.
Because while it is true that virtual networks cannot replace face-to-face meetings with other people, it is also true, as Claudio Pozzi, coordinator of the Rete Semi Rurali and WWOOF Italia says, that new media are useful “for supplementing this capacity for encounter” over such a vast territory as that occupied by the people working in the agricultural sector.
These topics are at home at the Cantine Argiolas which uses integrated farming methods and has a monitoring system installed on the vineyards for evaluating its carbon and water footprint.
“Thanks to this research”, says Valentina Argiolas, who handles communication and marketing for the family, “we have managed to achieve water savings of around one third, whilst maintaining the same irrigation efficiency”.
The farm has also invested in renewable energy and produces around 50% of its requirements following the installation of a photovoltaic system.
“We are constantly studying how to produce wine whilst respecting nature”, as the famous sommelier-star Charlie Arturaola reaffirms in his “Duel of wine” (produced by Lino Pujia), the guest par excellence of the Days and a testimonial of the successful union between cinema and wine.
Because if it is the ambition of the Sardegna Film Commission to “tell the world about Sardinia through movies”, Valentina Argiolas wants to “tell the world about Sardinia through its wines” and remembers when, in 2013, to celebrate twenty years of Turriga, the family turned to three of the island’s great ambassadors: the musician Paolo Fresu, the fashion designer Antonio Marras, and the writer Marcello Fois.
“With their help we realized a box set with a label created by Marras containing a CD with the jazz notes of Fresu selected for Argiolas and an original story by Marcello Fois. We like to think that we share an openness to the world, together with a very strong bond with our land, which is the very thing that makes it possible for us to reach everywhere”