Michele Oka Doner Honoree at the Naples Winter Wine Festival

After showing her work during the Architectural Digest REFUGE event featuring several outdoor installations at 1 Hotel & Homes South Beach for Art Basel, Michele Oka Doner will be honored as the featured artist of the 2016 Naples Winter Wine Festival at the Ritz-Carlton Golf Resort. The festival is the most successful international charity wine auction in the world.

The artist will create a custom-designed chandelier to be auctioned during the festival’s live action. It will be cast in bronze and inspired by a walk one evening dusk, the artist took, on a wooden ramp into the Everglades near Naples.  All proceeds will directly benefit children in need in Southwest Florida.

“To have an artist of Michele Oka Doner’s caliber attend the Naples Winter Wine Festival and donate a custom piece of art to our live auction is a dream come true,” said Sandi Moran, co-chair of the 2016 Naples Winter Wine Festival.

In addition to bidding on the one-of-kind chandelier, guest can bid on travel experiences, limited edition cars and unique wine lots. Over the years, the festival has raised more than $135 million dollars to support its founding organization, the Naples Children & Education Foundation.

Doner is a Miami native and is represented by the prestigious Marlborough Gallery in New York, and is best known for her art in public spaces, including Radiant Site in New York’s Herald Square subway, Flight at Washington’s Reagan International Airport and A Walk on the Beach at The Miami International Airport. The work in Miami features 9,000 bronze and mother-of-pearl sculptures lining a 1.25 mile concourse; one of the largest public artwork in the world.

“As an artist and a citizen of South Florida, born and raised, I am honored to participate in the Naples Winter Wine Festival, an organization that recognizes the challenges facing many children in Collier County,” said Michele Oka Doner. “The chandelier I’ll create for the winning bidder will be both work of art and symbolic gesture, as it is my intention to add more light to a community that ennobles itself with continuous generosity.”

Ticket packages to this year’s Naples Winter Wine Festival are limited to 580 guests. For more information about the NWWF, please visit http://www.napleswinefestival.com or call 888-837-4919.