Personally, when trying to decide whether food is art or not, I think back to my own definition of what art is. Art in my eyes is something that is created with the intention of evoking an emotional response and is simultaneously aesthetically pleasing. To view art, you have to use your senses. Whether that is vision, smell, taste, hearing, or touch. I think all five of our special senses provide a unique perspective to viewing art and neither of them should be discounted
compared to one another. Therefore, food in my opinion is definitely a form of art. From preparation to consumption, it is an artistic process that involves every single special sense. Making food allows an individual to experiment with different ideas and ultimately produce something unique. However, when thinking about fast food preparation as discussed in the presentation, I would draw the line there. I do not think producing bulk amounts of food with the use of machines is art. Creating food from scratch at home is different because it involves sensory input that machines cannot provide.
“It is generally agreed that there can be aesthetic reactions to tastes and smells” (Tefler 11). A pleasant smell can make someone happy while a horrible smell can do the opposite to someone’s mood. Similarly, a pleasant or an unpleasant taste can have an effect on a person’s emotions or mood because it is also a sensory experience. That being said, the taste of food has the ability to trigger various emotions from person to person, exactly like traditional art does. Furthermore, while people possess varying opinions about different works of art, people also have varying taste preferences for food. Overall, the world of food is highly variable and I definitely see it as an art. “Food does not represent anything else, as most literature and much visual art does”, but I believe it is a form of art in a different sense (25). If you want to become a professional chef, you have to go to culinary school in order to become certified. It is a profession that requires practice and skill—a characteristic of an “artist” in any field of work.
Finally, I think my personal opinion that food is art is most closely related to the theory of Modernism. “Included in the many new approaches and subjects that 18th century thinkers turned their attention to was a subject that came to be called ‘aesthetics’—a concern with elucidating principles such as taste and beauty that govern all the arts and indeed make them not simply paintings or statues but examples of (fine) ‘art’” (Dissanayake 17). For me, cooking food and even consuming it is a “kind of detached aesthetic experience” because it is the culminating product of the human senses (18).
January 29th, 2015 at 17:44
Very well-written post! I think you gave a pretty thorough analysis of the topics covered by this week’s reading assignment and video/radio presentations. You noted, and I admire this example of parallelism, that “…the taste of food has the ability to trigger various emotions from person to person, exactly like traditional art does.” My question to you is whether or not food in this “traditional” era was also an example of art. Certainly, in previous times food was just as much a mix of the senses as it is today, but was cooking a fish over an open flame in the primitive stages of existence still considered art? In my opinion, I would consider this more of an act of survival, rather than a “kind of detached aesthetic experience” (p. 18). In these times, I can’t imagine food would exhibit such traits like aesthetically pleasing of evoking any emotional response. In my opinion, I do not think that food has always stood out as an art form, but rather it is a newer addition to the realm.
Dissanayake, Ellen. (1991). What is art for? In K.C. Caroll (Ed.). Keynote addresses 1991 (NAEA Convention), (p. 15-26). Reston, VA: National Art Education Association.
Telfer, Elizabeth. (2002). Food as Art. Arguing About Art: Contemporary Philosophical Debates, 2nd Edition. Routledge, 2002.
January 29th, 2015 at 20:31
I think you bring up a great point here! I agree that cooking a fish over an open flame in the primitive stages of existence was more of an act of survival than art. This is because this act was being done in an attempt to satisfy hunger, rather than to evoke an emotional response or create something visually appealing. When it comes to food, I think it is considered art when there is an intention to make it visually aesthetic. For example, when a chef creates a meal at a restaurant, he or she often tries to make the dish both appealing to the tongue but to the eyes as well. When there is both visual and gustatory satisfaction, the overall experience is enhanced in my opinion.
Going back to food in the traditional era, I think the process of creating food definitely involved an artistic side. Tefler mentions the difference between art and craft in her writing, and describes food-making as more of a craft opposed to an art. I would agree with this point and I think it directly ties in with the point you bring up as well. I believe it was a craft or skill to come up with various ideas on how food should be cooked in the traditional era because it was not as easy as it is today. That being said, do you think the process of creating food is artistic or is it the final product itself? If you agree that the process is often the artistic piece, what are your thoughts on fast food?
January 30th, 2015 at 17:14
I agree with your post, but I’m curious what you think about fast food as art. Is it as artful as the fish? I think that today’s fast food falls into the weird category where the recipes are art, but because of the mass production process its very hard to consider the products themselves art to me. At the beginning of fast food the food was still hand made for the most part, it was just simplified. Today most fast food relies on microwave, and have little human touch within them.
February 1st, 2015 at 15:18
I agree with most of your post, except the fast food part. I think that fast food is an art, maybe not an art that everyone likes, but art none the less. Especially at first fast food was an art creating a mass amount of food for everyone is an art. And yes since then it has become less of an art and not as appreciated as it once was. I also think about when a foreigner comes to america for the first time and they do not have fast food where they are from, and they are starstruck by fast food and what it is. They see it more than just food that is mass produced but as an art form and a leap in technology. While it may not be aesthetically pleasing to everyone, not all art is.