A former commodities broker, Koons was at one point the world’s most expensive living artist. In 1997, his work Puppy, a giant dog covered in bright flowers, was installed at the entrance to the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain. In 2008, 17 of his works were featured in an exhibition at the Château de Versailles.

Mouton Rothschild has unveiled the label for its 2009 vintage - a design by British artist Anish Kapoor was selected to design the label for Chateau Mouton Rothschild 2009 vintage release.

The dramatic label features contrasts of brilliant red against black, described by the chateau as "at once austere and flamboyant, the gouache he has created for Mouton Rothschild 2009 expresses the fertile thrust of plant life, the result of an intense encounter between matter and light."

Kapoor, a sculptor, painter and visual artist is a British citizen of Indian origin. He was was born in Mumbai (Bombay) in 1954 and settled in England in 1972. His recent works include the giant

Chinese Artist Xu Lei has designed the label for the 2008 vintage of Chateau Mouton Rothschild, a sign of the growing importance of the Chinese wine market.

Lei has restyled the traditional Mouton emblem with an ink drawing which shows the famous ram standing between two halves of the moon.

As soon as rumors circulated in late 2009 that a Chinese artist would design the prestigious Mouton label, the Chinese market responded. Prices immediately shot upwards from the starting base of £1800 per case to £2200, and now prices are at least £6,000 per case.

The news comes hot on the heels of a Chinese led surge for Chateau Lafite Rothschild after it was announced a few weeks ago that all bottles and magnums of the 2008 vintage would feature a neck engraving of the Chinese symbol for the figure eight. Prices for 2008 Lafite likewise soared and it’s now changing hands at £10,000 per case.

Lei is a graduate from the Nanjing Academy of Fine Arts and artistic director of Beijing’s Today Art Museum.

For its 2008 vintage, Mr. Xu has drawn a ram, Mouton Rothschild’s emblem, perched on a rock, the winery revealed yesterday.

Mr. Xu is the second Chinese artist chosen by Mouton Rothschild — the 1996 label was designed by Gu Gan, who is best known for his calligraphic painting. This time around, the choice of Mr. Xu comes as the swelling ranks of wealthy Chinese wine buyers are imposing themselves on the global wine market. Hong Kong is now the largest wine auction center in the world by dollar sales, surpassing New York and London — and Mouton Rothschild’s move follows a similar recent announcement from one of its main Bordeaux-producing rivals.

Just a few weeks ago, Château Lafite unveiled the bottle design for its 2008 vintage, revealing that it would have an embossed Chinese character “8,” a particularly auspicious figure in Chinese tradition. In the days following its announcement, Lafite — which is widely considered to be the favorite wine of rich Chinese buyers, and which entered into a joint venture with a Chinese winemaker earlier this year — saw the price of the yet-to-be-delivered bottles of 2008 vintage jump 17% in just 48 hours, according to Liv-ex, an online fine-wine exchange.

Prices have continued to rise since, according to Adam Bilbey, direct sales manager at fine-wine merchants Berry Bros. & Rudd in Hong Kong, to an overall 40% increase since the day of the announcement.

Mouton Rothschild’s announcement was somewhat expected. Wine website Decanter.com reported in September 2009 that the winery would choose a Chinese artist to design the label for its 2008 vintage.