After reading this article, I believe food can be viewed as a minor art because it is necessarily transient, cannot have meaning and cannot move us (Elizabeth, 24). According to the Ellen Dissanayake’s point of view, “there is no appreciation of art without interpretation” (Dissanayake, 5), and art is for art’s sake not for other’s sake. Also, from the Elizabeth Telfer’s article, he states that “(he) appreciates the thing’s look or sound for its own sake, not for any benefit it brings to him or others” (Elizabeth, 10). These two authors have the same interpretation of the art that art is created for its own meaning, and it should be interpreted and appreciated objectively not for benefitting others. Telfer makes many comparisons between art and food mainly from these two questions: How the object is regarded? (Classifying) and does the object merit the label work of art? (Evaluative).then she get the result that art just can be as simple form of art.
From my perspective, food and drink is too physical, bodily and lacks sufficiently complex, first, as we all know the aim of creating food and drink is against hungry and they are also needed to survive for humans, and they are do not have its own special meaning like music, food can be appraised as good but it can never shake us fundamentally as shown by tears or fear, instead, music can do it. Also, there are various designing kinds of food by cookers, but it is just for attracting people to buy and eat it not just for appreciation. Next, maybe you can say food has its own meaning, for instance, it can stands for a symbol of a nation’s way of life and traditions. Yes, I agree with this. Yet, food does not have many kinds of meaning as major art of forms, for example, a representational painting can present the history, culture and even some emotion like to inspiring people to do something. Furthermore, human’s aesthetic reaction on food may not truly for appreciation of its beauty, and they are just being influenced by its taste and willing to consume it. The individuals would consider eating as the most important point not its look or smell. For instance, some people go to restaurant is not for see the food, and they want to eat it. On the contrast, if people go to museum or watching movies, they are for the sake of doing these activities, rather than for the sake of surviving. So I personally believe food cannot be seen as major forms of art, and it just can be seen as a minor art or even not can be appreciated as a form of art. But I have a question that can we say increase the quality of food will raise the level of art, if food as a minor art? Why?
Lili,
I like the term you used to describe food here – “minor art.” It is definitely difficult to call food art when it is such a temporary item and it is something that humans need to survive. It is quite difficult to make art out of something that is necessary and temporary.
I do like how to bring up the example of certain foods relating to countries and their cultural presence. This is where I start to think maybe food really is art. This is why I like the term minor art used to describe food.