In “A Matter of Taste”, William Deresiewicz discusses our society’s new obsession with food. Deresiewicz believes that food has replaced art as an area of focus in our current day civilization. Deresiewicz states that: “what has happened is not that food has led to art, but that it has replaced it. Foodism has taken on the sociological characteristics of what used to be known — in the days of the rising postwar middle class, when Mortimer Adler was peddling the Great Books and Leonard Bernstein was on television — as culture” (Deresiewicz). Deresiewicz brings up aestheticism and ends the article with a solid argument that food is not art, which is why I thought it would be a good source to compare with Telfer’s ideas of aesthetics and artistry.
Telfer believes that food should be considered an art. Telfer argues that food should be considered a minor art; for food can still cause emotion, it can be inspirational, and it can please us in more ways than simple nutrition. Telfer feels: “that good food can elate us, invigorate us, startle us, excite us, cheer us with a kind of warmth and joy, but cannot shake us fundamentally in that way of which the symptoms are tears or a sensation almost of fear” (26). For these reasons Telfer argues that food should be considered art. However, these are all feelings of joy. To be so single-faceted across a whole genre (food) seems to me to be less “arty”. Food for this reason can be seen to have one emotion-striking node (joy) and to me art should be able to affect you on many levels. Paintings can make you smile or frown; music can make you cry or dance; sculptures can make you ponder and daydream. These classic forms of art all can do more than just cause joy they can be used to convey any number of emotions. Even a swing set can make you feel exhilarated or pain (if you jump off and hurt yourself). Does that make a swing set art? A puppy can make you delighted, fuming, loving, but is it art? Food can make you happy and it serves the purpose of nourishment but that doesn’t mean it is art; this is Deresiewicz argument.
Deresiewicz does believe that food can induce some emotional response and that it is more than shear sustenance. However, he seems to agree with Ursom that food cannot be art. Food tends to draw an aesthetic appreciation but nothing more than that. As Deresiewicz says: “Meals can evoke emotions, but only very roughly and generally, and only within a very limited range — comfort, delight, perhaps nostalgia, but not anger, say, or sorrow, or a thousand other things. Food is highly developed as a system of sensations, extremely crude as a system of symbols. Proust on the madeleine is art; the madeleine itself is not art.” Deresiewicz believes that food lacks the emotional depth to be considered art. While food can be delicious and its presentation can be resounding, cause satisfaction, but not the full array of emotions that art can make you feel. Food can only really cause disgust when it has gone past its sell by date. Food can only cause anger when you don’t get what you ordered or it takes much longer than its supposed to arrive. These emotions aren’t really generated by the food itself but have been caused by some exterior force upon the food. Food adds to the aesthetic reaction but it is the other stimuli that garner true responses. I never really thought to judge food against the full possibilities of art in the way Deresiewicz does. It is easy to say that something can be art but now after reviewing Deresiewicz’s argument to judge food against art it doesn’t completely hold up. Food cannot truly cause a reaction in an encompassing manner the way art can.
Food may have come to mean similar things as art and be as important in our culture but that doesn’t mean it is the same thing. In reference to food, Deresiewicz says: “It has developed, of late, an elaborate cultural apparatus that parallels the one that exists for art, a whole literature of criticism, journalism, appreciation, memoir and theoretical debate. It has its awards, its maestros, its televised performances” (Deresiewicz). Food may have worked its way into pop culture through vast popularity but just because it’s popular doesn’t mean its art, as “A good risotto is a fine thing, but it isn’t going to give you insight into other people, allow you to see the world in a new way, or force you to take an inventory of your soul” (Deresiewicz). I appreciate food and there are many people who find it artistic in its own sense but that doesn’t mean food (in general) should be considered art. There are exceptions, like the industry of molecular gastronomy and pop art featuring Campbell’s soup.
Deresiewicz, William (October, 2012). A Matter of Taste [On-Line Newspaper]. Retrieved 27 Oct 2013. <http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/28/opinion/sunday/how-food-replaced-art-as-high-culture.html?_r=0>.
