Purcari Winery is paying a tribute to the film director Viorel Mardare, who would have turned 40 today, by launching a limited edition of its award-winning wine “Freedom Blend”. Branded “Viorel”, the wine will not be available for purchase, but only distributed to friends, family, colleagues and those who supported the late director as he battled with cancer.
The bottle label features an iconic image once posted by Mardare on Facebook and which came to be known as “Viorel’s heart”, along with a remark that he wrote in gratitude to a fundraiser in his support: “I didn’t think there was so much love around”. The back label reads: “We are transient and we are eternal. Here and there, there and here. There is a place for kindness, dreaming and resurrection everywhere…”.
To honor the late director, a number of TV channels will air the commercial “We are the Champions”, which Viorel Mardare shot for Purcari Winery.
Additionally, the winery has announced it is launching a Viorel Mardare merit scholarship to be awarded monthly to a talented Academy of Arts student who is to become a film director.
Born on 7 October 1981, Viorel Mardare was a journalist, an acclaimed film director and simply an admirable person. As a young talent, he worked with the renowned Moldovan film directors Igor Cobîleanski and Sergiu Prodan. Mardare’s masterful shorts, cinematic commercials and powerful awareness-raising videos transpire love for Moldova and fellow Moldovans. As a journalist, he is best known for his critical reviews and pamphlets that ridiculed pseudo-values. On 9 March 2019, Viorel died from adenocarcinoma.
