Giorgio Morandi – Croissant French Toast
In France, French toast is called pain perdu, or ‘lost bread’ to highlight the way the dish reclaims unfortunate lumps of bread that become too hard to eat. The recipe of a stale bit of bread, dipped in eggy milk and fried, is made especially indulgent through the use of a croissant – crispy on...
Colour Orange – Carsten Höller – Marinated Chanterelles
Beautiful butterflies, stunning flowers, and fruiting trees attract and deflect attention with their often intricate colouration. Targeted for particular audiences, a single color can carry conflicting messages. In nature, orange signals vitamin rich potency and likewise poisonous lethal doses, though it also functions simply as a scare tactic. In works by artist Carsten Höller, orange...
Colour Orange – Margaret Preston – Thai Papaya Salad
The colour orange has always been one of warning used for it’s eye-catching qualities to delineate danger. The pigment was produced through a difficult process of grinding down madder, the pink root of a small bush. Madder is often used to make ‘rose madder genuine’ watercolor paint but when used as a dye, a rich...
Daguerreotype Still Life – Salt & Vinegar Sweet Potato Fries
The still life has had an important role within the history of photography since the inception of the medium in the mid-19th century. As the technology advanced, still life compositions were the simplest works to produce because the inanimate objects gave the artist the greatest amount of control during the long exposure time. With further...
Wayne Thiebaud – Pop Art Cakes
The frosting upon Wayne Thiebaud’s 1963 painting, Cakes, is so thickly applied that I am often tempted to reach out, run my finger along one of the perfect cake-tops to taste the sugary dessert. Thiebaud cleverly uses a thick application of paint to mimic the look and texture of frosting, highlighting the idea of ‘object...
Gustavo Montoya – Eggs Galette à la Mexicana
The flavours of this traditionally haphazard French dessert are inspired by the Mexican classic, huevos rancheros. Traditionally, the eggs are cracked into a bubbling mixture of tomato, chilli and pepper and cooked until soft. The egg and tomatoes are then scooped into a tortilla and eaten like a burrito with a bit of cheese. In...
Khoo Kongsi Stone Carving – Murtabak
From fried oysters to cendol, I consumed a number of delectables while travelling in Malaysia in late October. Our restaurants ranged from street food in Penang to a private beach BBQ on Redang Island. Malaysian food is an exciting blend of Indian, Chinese and Malay cuisines with regional curries and fried noodle courses. I tried...
Raphaelle Peale – Steak Salad in a Lettuce Leaf with Fresh Herbs
Visual characteristics of the slab of raw beef in Raphaelle Peale’s Still Life with Steak (c.1817) are repeated within other elements of the composition. The curve of the cabbage is mimicked by the curve of the fat and the veins of the leaf are also found in the white threads of sinew of the beef....
Colour Red – Hung Liu – Rhubarb Tart
Hung Liu’s artistic production is a process of recollection – a symbolic excavation. Having weathered the re-education of artists vis-a-vis Mao’s Cultural Revolution and immigration to the U.S. in 1984, Hung Liu’s influences are richly transcultural. She is known as one of the very first Chinese artists to study within the U.S. and has since...
Colour Red – Claude Monet – Steak Tartare
In the mid-16th century, Spain began importing a vibrant red pigment from the New World that was so highly sought after that the source was held as a national secret. The dye was extracted from the blood of a female cochineal, a wingless insect that lives upon the leaves of the prickly pear. The dye...
Colour Project
The colour of a food or dish plays an important role in its appeal. Before tasting a tomato, we know that if it is green, it is unripe. These inherent expectations of the natural colouration of the world around us present an interesting challenge to artists. To represent skin tones in a portrait or the...
Diego Rivera – Shrimp Tacos
While attending the San Carlos Academy in Mexico City, Diego Rivera worked in the studio of José Guadalupe Posada, a leading printmaker of the time. The lithograph, Niño con Taco, was created the same year that Rivera commenced his work on the Detroit Industry frescoes (1932-33). The lithograph features a stylised little boy in his...