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| One of the artworks made by Gino di Maggio and Daniel Spoerri |
There can be found many similarities and differences between Dutch and Italian eating habits. Lately I’ve become interested in the latter one.
As I’ve mentioned before Italians love to eat and made eating an important part of their daily rhythm.
The Dutch and other inhabitants from Northern European countries also like to
eat, but seem to value this in another way than their southern neighbors.
Milano hosts a lot of exhibitions. Some weeks ago I visited
a mostre in the Palazzo Reale.
The exhibition showed an overview of artworks made in Milano made in the tumultuous seventies. In
those years Italy went through hard times with political struggle, an economic
crisis and terrorist attacks. The artworks reacted on the events that happened
during those years; pictures of demonstrations on the square in front of the
Duomo, paintings discussing the relation between social events and the autonomy
of an artist and poetry. One of the many works on display attracted me in
particular.
Food has been an important topic of art for many decades. We
know the still lives of fruit and game, see the importance of food in movies
and like to look at beautiful decorated cakes at the bakery around the corner. But
to make leftovers part of the work is something more exeptional.
Gino di Maggio and Daniel Spoerri created an artwork
halfway the 1970’s that reminded me of some more recent, namely the Last Supper by Raul Ortega Ayala which was performed and exhibited at Stroom in the Dutch
city of Den Haag in 2010. Both artworks showed the leftovers of a dinner which
was eaten by a group of people which wasn’t familiar until they became the main
actors of each particular artwork. Although the event itself – eating the
dinner – was indispensable to create the artwork, it was the display of the
leftovers of that event that became important for the audience.
Both artworks where performed and displayed in different
countries. However, they seem to be almost similar in actions: a group of
people - whether they know each other or not – sit around a table and focus on
their meal and the discussions they can have with their table mates.
No matter how similar these to works seem to be, to me there
is a big difference in the level of northern and southern European ‘food
exhibitionism’. In the north, everyone just eats when they feel like, whether
this is at a dining table, in the train or during a walk though the city. In
the south you will hardly see anyone combining one of his meals with other
activities besides having a conversation with the one he is joining his meal
with.
Bravo for both artists who made the events – joining a
dinner while seated at a table with others – such an important work of art in
both countries!
