“Food as Art” research essay

The article”Is Food Art? Chefs, Creativity, and the Restaurant Business?” was written by FabioParassecoli, associate professor and coordinator of food studies in New York City. It introduces three important elements of the topic of “food as art”, they are chefs, creativity and the restaurant business. Parassecoli says that the question of whether food can be considered an art form resonates among scholars, practitioners, and aficionados. This article successfully related these elements to art. first of all, it points out that “Chefs are not just craftsmen, artisans, or business persons; they are expected to offer patrons (and critics) dishes and menus that stimulate and surprise eaters”, which has also discussed by Tefler in his article “Food as Art” (2002) : Tefler was talking about how people who don’t think food as art simply view chefs as artisans, however, Parassecoli thinks that many Chefs has the goals that similar with artists: they try to surprise people with their creatures. Also, just like today’s artist, they are using the technologies and medians to introduces themselves and their works to the world. Second, Parassecoli cites an essay “Food and New York city” as resource to explain avant-garde as “the pioneers or innovators in any art in a particular period”, “the presence of innovators that can be considered an intelligentsia, and a specific environment: the arts”. Cooking is a kind of creative process which has the similar characteristics with art. Lastly, the author shows the business element, the art marketing and the food marketing both has direct relationships with the investors and the cosumers. Young artist usually has the finical help form investors and then as the development of their career, the price of their artworks are determined but the market. Likewise, the Chefs are more likely to rely on investor’s money to produce the outcome, the spaces for their creativity may limited by this rule. However, today’s young gifted chefs prefer to take the risk from the market and try to show their creatures, the tension between food market requirements and creativity is the same with the other art fields, “is not easy to resolve”.

I liked this article because it not only compares the food and art themselves, for example, the taste, smell and the patten which could get people’s aesthetic attention, but also pay attention to food and art industries. This article focus on the element that I am most interested in: the Chef and their innovation, I think these are important factors of the topic”Food as Art”. In the article “Food as Art”, the author said: “it is obvious that foodstuffs can be made into visual objects which are works of art”. ( Tefler, p13). Food and drinks are works of art especially at the sense of the taste and smell, the foodstuffs are doing the works of art to create these outcomes. The author considered both the cookery and the cook by focusing not he creating processes. However, Parassecoli further introduces the Chefs put their creativities to produce outcomes as sometime they are facing the refuse from the “narrow-minded customers”, the creating isn’t easier for the chefs than the artistes.  In this case, both the chefs in the three star restaurant and an artist are facing the same level of changeling. 

Both these two articles talks about the Chefs and foodstuffs, if food is art, are these chefs and foodstuffs are attests? The answer seems obvious, however, many people might questioning the topic “food as Art” with an statement: aren’t chefs are just craftsman? Parassecoli says that “chefs are not just craftsmen, artisans, or business persons; they are expected to offer patrons (and critics) dishes and menus that stimulate and surprise them, find new methods to manipulate ingredients, and interact with technology and design in ways that keep them on the cutting edge and ensure coverage from press, TV, and the Internet” (Parassecoli, 2013).  It give the ideas that chefs are using the some path that the artists are using to be successful, both of them are creative jobs. Similarly, Tefler gives the difference between art and craft: art is original but craft is carrying the instruction, therefore the difference between art and craft is not between people but the aspects between the works. I count agree with it more, if the consideration on if food are art are based on the creativeness, some food can qualify as art and the cook is not just craftsman.

Work Cites

Parassecoli, Fabio. (2013, August). Is Food Art? Chefs, Creativity, and the Restaurant Business? Huffington Post [On-Line Newspaper]. Retrieved August 1, 2014 from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/fabio-parasecoli/food-art_b_3830791.html

Tefler, E. (2002). Food as Art. In Neill, A. & Riley, A. (eds.) Arguing About Art: Contemporary Philosophical Debates (2nd ed., Chap 2). New York, NY: Routledge.