The harmony of opposites

Amativo is a meeting. The kind that shouldn’t work, but ends up writing unforgettable stories. It is a wine born almost twenty-five years ago from an intuition, from a stubborn desire, from an idea that became an obsession. It was imagined by Augusto Cantele, at a time when no one thought to combine two grape varieties so distant from each other. Negroamaro and Primitivo, the first austere, the latter exuberant. Two different souls, two different rhythms, two maturations that almost seem to mock those who watch them: Primitivo is harvested at the end of August, when the light is still full, the heat still sweltering, and the wind, if it arrives, is only there to scatter the thirsty vines. Negroamaro, on the other hand, waits until late September, when the sun bows to autumn, and time seems to slow down.

It wasn’t easy, bringing together such different personalities. It wasn’t a given that they would be able to communicate. But great wines, like great stories, are built on the balance of opposites, on harmonies born from contrast. Because beauty is never in the obvious, but in the meeting of forces that balance each other out.

Amativo takes shape in the cellar like a story that writes itself, one chapter at a time. Primitivo opens the scene, vinified first, giving space to its rich ripe fruit, its generous roundness, its enveloping warmth. Then comes the wait. And within that wait, there’s the intuition: Gianni Cantele observes, tastes, imagines. Only when Primitivo has said everything it has to say, does the turn of Negroamaro arrive. But it’s not a casual addition, not a mathematical calculation. It’s a choice. A balance to be found.

The result is a wine that lives on contrasts. Primitivo brings its jam-like sweetness, its broad volume, its enveloping richness. Negroamaro responds with a more defined tannin, a spicy note, a bitter finish that doesn’t extinguish the sip, but gives it new life. Together, they create a story that doesn’t seek easy compromises, that is sipped slowly, like a tale with something to say.